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REMINISCENCES 



OF THE 



EARLY DAYS 



OF 



FORT WORTH 



BY 



CAPT. J. C. TERRELL 



1906 

TEXAS PRTG. CO. 
COI'VRIGHT APPLIED FOR. FORT WORrH 



Oift 
Auih. 
(fmoR) 

23 An '07 



INTRODUCTION. 



These reminiscences, rescued from loss by the family scrap- 
book, are more especially published to please those who knew 
the people and the incidents of our Fort Worth frontier 
times. 

Should this object be attained the writer will be gratified. 
He dedicates this little book to the pioneers of Tarrant 
County and to their decendants. 

J. C. TERRELL. 



INDEX. 

Capt. J. C. Terrell ■ 4 

Killintj Hogs in I'ort Worth and the Early Days 7 

Lookini^' Hackward 9 

"There Were Giants in Those Days" — E. M. Daggett and Rev. M. 

Matthews ' 18 

Pranks of Lawvers — Afterwards Judge J. W. Ferris and Col. John C. 

McCoy . .' 22 

Story of Rev. John Denton After Whom Denton County, Texas, Was 

Named 27 

Weatherford, Texas, in the Reconstruction Days 31 

The Only Twenty Dollar Felony Bond '. 34 

Whv vSam Woodv IvOcked His Wagon Wheels Every Night 36 

The Fort Worth'University ' 38 

Nathaniel Terr}' 39 

Old Paul Tyler and His Dog "Sounder" 41 

My First Hunt in Tarrant County • . 44 

A Mother's Love— vSwapping Babies 46 

A vShort Sketch of Thos. P. Ochiltree 48 

Quinine in the Sixties 52 

Patriotism in the Schools , 55 

Shall the Whipping Post be Revived? - . 56 

Jacob Samuel and Lee Chalmers 58 

Confederate Reunion in Memphis 60 

Brother Dehart's Powerful Prayer 63 

The Charms of Music 66 

Pecan Time in Birdville 69 

Uncle John Kinder, the Famous Shot and Humanitarian 70 

Lewis H. Brown Family 73 

Santa Anna's vSilver Wash Basin 74 

Overland Trip to California in '52 With Extracts From My Old Diary. . 76 

The INIasonic Bell at Fort Worth 92 

In Memoriam — J. P. Smith 94 

The Soul -Poem 97 



ILLUSTRATIONS. 



Capt. J. C. Terrell and ( irandson 3 

Capt. J. C Terrell's Second Law Office and Capt. M. B. Lovd's First 

Bank 4 

E. M. Daggett 8 

A.G.Walker 13 

James Grimsley . ■ . • 17 

Edward Hovenkamp 21 

J. Samuel, J. C. Terrell and Sam Woody . 26 

Gideon Nance — Si.xteen Years Countv Clerk . . ■•• 30 

Sam Woodv, Howard Peak, E. S. Terrell, J. C. Terrell, Richard King, 

Dan 'Parker 35 

C. B. Daggett — Owned the First Store in Tarrant County 43 

Robt. Tanahill— Countv Judge 47 

' 'Uncle' ' Jack Durrett— The Fiddler 65 




CAPT. J. C. TERRELL AND GRANDSON. 



CAPT. J. C. TERRELL. 



Capt. J. C. Terrell landed in Fort Worth in the early 
50's, and this is a sketch of his second law office, which he 
has had removed to his elegant residence on the Southwest 
Side, as a kind of souvenir of these old days. This build- 
ing was removed from Birdville. the former County seat. 
Like Col. Smith, he is still looking backward to the time 
when Fort Worth was a baby, and he acted as one of the 
fathers of the foundling. The artist kodaked this as it 





CAPT. J. C. TEKKELL'S SECOND LAW OFFICP: AND C A I' P .M B LOYD'S 

FIRST BANK. 

stood to show the tlieii with the now. Capt. Terrell laid 
the foundation of successful life in this old building, and, 
we cannot chide him for the remembrance of his old friend. 
Capt. M. B. Loyd opened his bank in this building March 1, 
1873, and he has continued in this business from that day 
until this, being now president of the First National Bank. 



CAPT. J. C. TERRELL. 5 

Captain Joseph Christopher Terrell was born in Sumner 
County, Tenn., October 29, 1831, while his father's family 
was en route from Virginia to Missouri to seek a new 
home. His people are Virginians, of Quaker descent. His 
father, Dr. C. J. Terrell, died the year after settling at 
Booneville, Cooper County, Mo., and it was there he was 
reared. He studied law under his eldest brother, Alex- 
ander W. Terrell, then at St. Joseph, Mo., but now of 
Austin, Tex., one of the oldest of the old Texans, and late 
United States Minister to Turkey under Cleveland's last 
administration. At the early age of 20, Young Joe joined 
the Argonauts in quest of golden fleece on the Pacific slope. 
For five years he floated around in California and 
Oregon, a child of fortune, without realizing all he 
expected, for the memory of his dear old mother haunt- 
ed him, and so he made for the Old Dominion and 
old associations. This was in 1856. In 1857, he again 
turned his face towards the Pacific coast, but took 
in his brother at Austin. After a brief visit there, in 
February, 1857, he was passing through this, the then ham- 
let of Fort Worth, on his way back to California, 
and here met his old school fellow, Dabney C. Dade, now 
of Springfield, Mo. This settled his destiny. They were 
not long forming the law partnership of Terrell & Dade, 
which continued here till the beginning of the Civil War. 
Dade went back North. Terrell, though voting against 
secession, did an act which commends his love for his native 
Southland stronger than in ordinary cases of patriotism — 
he sided with his people, under the motto, "My country — 
may she ever be in the right; but, right or wrong, my 
country." He recruited a company here in this place and 
marched down Main street — such of it as was in exist- 
ence then — and joined Waller's battalion as Company F, 
in Green's cavalry brigade of Confederate troops. He 
took part in the many battles of his command on this side 
of the great river, mainly in Louisiana and Texas, and came 
back here with the remnant of his war-worn veterans, and 
began life anew at the bottom rung of the ladder. He 
is an optimist, and ever finds more to laugh at than weep 



6 EARLY DAYS OF FORT WORTH. 

over, well remembering what another has written, "Laugh, 
and the world laughs with you; but weep, and you weep 
alone." He is president of the Old Settlers' Association of 

Tarrant County. 

C. C. CUMMINGS. 






KILLING HOGS IN FORT WORTH AND THE EARLY 

DAYS. 



"They tell me that I am the oldest real estate owner in 
the city. The corner of First and Main streets has been mine 
for forty-eight years. Here, three years before the Civil 
War, with the aid of a whipsaw, my schoolmate and part- 
ner, Dabney C. Dade and myself, built a law office — one- 
story frame building, with brick chimneys at each end and 
an open passageway. Here Dade and myself had our bache- 
lor home ; slept in one room, law office in the other — hunting 
and fishing implements mixed with law papers and books 
scattered around. 

"Tarrant County then voted about 700 — two terms of 
District Court a year, limited to one week. My law office 
was here until 1870. M. T. Johnson, Dade, J. P. Smith and 
myself voted with Gen. Sam Houston against secession, 
which only carried in this county by twenty-seven majority. 
Dade was then District Attorney. He refused to take the 
oath to the Confederacy, resigned, and went to Spring- 
field, Mo., where he now lives. I accepted from Judge 
Divine the office of Confederate receiver — after a while 
resigned and raised a cavalry company — Company F, Wal- 
ler's Battalion, Green's Brigade — started to the war from 
this corner and served to the end, then returned and re- 
sumed business at the old stand. It was here I had my 
first home. My oldest child was born here, corner First and 
Main streets. 

"There was no hog law then. I built a smokehouse and 
killed ten hogs, averaging 225 pounds each, bought a butch- 
er's cleaver and block, smoked and saved the meat and 
made two barrels of soft soap. No miser ever gloated over 
hoarded gold as I did over that wealth of meat. I never 
dreamed of parting with any of it, although there were only 
three of us in the family. I was 39 years old when I mar- 
ried, and had for several years been fed in boarding houses, 
and wanted a full meathouse, hence I grieved to sell meat 
or lard. The pleasures of married life and of peace can 
only be fully realized by old men and soldiers," 




E. M DAGGETT. 



LOOKING BACKWARD. 



In 1857 I left Austin and came to Fort Worth in com- 
pany with Col. M. T. Johnson, Dr. (afterward Governor) 
J. W. Throckmorton, Charley De Morse of the Clarksville 
Standard, and a young attorney from Virginia named Jor- 
dan, who located in Parker County. The Fort then had 
some 300 inhabitants, nearly all white, and mostly of the 
border States— that is, from States bordering on Mason 
and Dixon's line. This county, and a long strip of terri- 
tory north of Johnson and south of Denton County, con- 
stituted "Peter's Colony," an emigration company char- 
tered by the young State of Texas, managed by Hedgecoke, 
with headquarters in Louisville, Ky. Under the act of 
the 26th of August, 1857, known as the pre-emption law, 
this country was open for location, survey and settlement 
by actual settlers. I came, a young lawyer, to grow up 
with the country. The nearest railroad was over 200 miles 
distant. Owing to the liberal homestead provisions in the 
Constitution of 1845, since made more liberal and definite 
by the Constitution of 1876, a superior class of early settlers 
were attracted hither. Business men who had failed in 
other States came here with the remnants of their fortunes 
and secured hom.es and property free from the writ of 
scire facias. It was not unusual to meet higher culture 
in a cabin and to see pianos on dirt floors. As a rule, the 
foreigner settled in the North, then, objecting to our "pe- 
culiar instaitution." 

As for a law oflice, none was to be had for love or money. 
I hired a man named John Branon, and in a few weeks had 
a two-room office building, with chimneys, on the corner 
of First and Main streets. The timbers were cut with a 

whipsaw. Oflice in one end — sleeping room in the other 

and the "hall' was used for saddle, fishing tackle, etc. Hos- 
pitality was only 30c per gallon, with corn stoppers. This 
property I yet own. 

Judge Dabney C. Dade, now of Springfield, Mo., and who 
formerly had been secretary for Gov. Joe Lane, first Gov- 



10 EARLY DA ¥"8 OP FORT WORTH. 

ernor of Oregon, came also in 1857. He had been my 
schoolmate, and we became law partners. Both were bach- 
elors ; society was decidedly exclusive. The sexes were di- 
vided in meeting, sitting on opposite sides of the house, 
the women with "heads covered," but with no chicken or 
bird feathers on their bonnets. 

Being strangers, we made poor progress in making our 
way with the girls, and so, tiring of hunting, fishing and of 
Oldhams & White's digest, and of the long Sundays, and 
as we both loved Sunday school, I suggested to Dabney that 
we start one and break the social ice. He boarded with 
Mrs. W. T. Ferguson; I, with Mrs. Lawrence Steel, where 
the concrete hotel afterward stood. Dabney was a "disciple 
of the Christian order," and on occasion could pray and 
"pitch and carry a tune." It seems to me that the girls 
were prettier then. Their meek eyes and bright faces haunt 
me still, and then, their dresses were of reasonable length. 
Oh! the halcyon days of youth! Melodions, stately organs 
and pretty soloists appeared afterward to help us worship 
God. As for myself I was "unattached," but gave val- 
uable service teaching the Bible class ; was well up in faiths, 
baptisms, and was specially versed in Revelations. We 
bought a desk and books and subscribed for Sunday School 
Union literature. We had a prosperous and profitable time, 
broke the ice and got acquainted with the girls, and Sundays 
became too short then. And thus the establishment of our 
first Sunday school in Fort Worth. 

Of course, when the real "cloth" appeared, Dabney and 
myself retired from office, but stuck to the Sunday school 
as the "nursery of the church." 



Bill Seburn's Conversion. 

Had Clarence S. Darrow witnessed reconstruction in the 
South, he would more fervently deprecate nearly all penal 
laws and "Resist Not Evil" would perhaps be a stronger 
book. 

In 1867, when a pocket pistol constituted the most im- 
portant part of every Southern gentleman's attire, and 
when excellent Robertson County (Kentucky) goods, sup- 



LOOKING BACKWARD. 11 

plemented with Tuck Boaz' and Jud Roland's moonshine, 
sold in our markets overt at a reasonable figure, every man 
was a law unto himself. While ordinarily human life was 
held rather cheaply, lynch law, for aggravated offenses for 
many reasons necessarily and rightfully obtained. Justice 
did not travel with leaden feet, and taxes were nominal. 
Two crimes were never condoned — theft of horses and dis- 
turbance of religious worship. They were severely pun- 
ished, without the benefit of clergy. 

There then lived on Village Creek, in Tarrant County, 
one Bill Seburn, a large man with a heart as big as a court 
house. He had been a good soldier, was freckle-faced, with 
sorrel, bushy hair. He occasionally indulged. His truth 
was found at the bottom of a bottle, and when Bill so 
found it he invariably exploded with voice and pistol, not 
to injure, but merely to celebrate. He then became unto 
himself a small Fourth of July. 

An old-fashioned Southern Methodist camp meeting, led 
by Capt. (Rev.) W. G. Veal, afterwards first commander of 
R. E. Lee Camp, was being held at Henderson Springs, on 
Village Creek. Early Sunday morning found me there. A 
large brush arbor and a number of tents and wagons argued 
a big meeting. From near a grove a man mysteriously 
beckoned me to approach. I cautiously obeyed, and when he 
turned I recognized Bill, who appeared with a day-before- 
yesterday haggard look, and with troubled face and averted 
eyes, he slowly said: "Cap, yesterday at the Fort, at old 
Ed. Terrell's, I tanked up on whisky and started home with 
a full bottle. Passing here I saw two or three men and a 
lot of women holding a prayer meeting. I rode under the 
arbor, and just for fun shot into the brush overhead. I 
don't remember exactly, but my wife told me all. Oh, it 
is awful! What shall I do?" I told him that from a legal 
view there was no hope, that no one was ever acquitted 
in Texas of that crime proven. I asked him what church 
his wife belonged to. With a deprecatory nod toward the 
camp he answered: "That shebang over there." Seeing 
that he was contrite and enhungered, I advised him to 
about-face on his sins and join that church. Looking quick- 



12 EARLY DAYS OF FORT WORTH. 

ly up, as with newly inspired hope, he answered, "You 
reckon?" 

The day meeting- was not a success, but at night, after 
a "powerful sermon" from the text, "The harvest is passed, 
the summer is ended, and I am not saved," succeeded by a 
prayer from a gifted woman, in a wierd and shrill voice, 
uncapping hell and dwarfing Dante's "Inferno" itself, and 
a call for mourners with the hymn, "Show Pity, O, Lord; 
0, Lord, Forgive." Imagine my surprise at seeing Bill 
approach the altar, followed by neighbors and happy breth- 
ren. The very biggest brand had been snatched from the 
burning. 

Bill proved true to his vows, is now in the Panhandle of 
glorious Texas, with cattle on a hundred hills, and is begirt 
with numerous children. 

Justice Grimsley took no cognizance of the offense. The 
grand jury failed to indict. Hence Poe, mentor of the Cross 
Timbers, stood mute, and I lost a fee. "So let the Lord be 
thanked." 



Concerning Sam Houston. 

In 1857 Gen. Sam Houston, while yet a member of the 
United States Senate, ran for Governor of Texas against 
Hardin R. Runnels, the Democratic nominee, whose compet- 
itor in convention was M. T. Johnson of Tarrant County. 
Many of Houston's friends were alienated from him be- 
cause of his presenting in the Senate the famous preachers' 
petition, calling them "10,000 vice-regents of heaven," 
for the abolition of slavery in the District of Columbia and 
in the forts, arsenals and dock yards of the United States. 
Runnels was rather an ordinary man, a large slaveholder. 
He beat Houston 8,924 votes out of a total of 56,190. Two 
years thereafter Houston beat Runnels for the same office 
by about 6,000 votes. This was on the eve of secession, 
and Houston was a pronounced Union man. 

In 1860, Houston being Governor, Texas, by about a 
two-thirds vote, seceded from the Federal Union. The 
Legislature and the secession convention were in session 
at Austin at the same time. Gen. Houston and his secre- 



LOOKING BACKWARD. 



13 



tary of state, Mr. Cave, refused to support the new Gover- 
nor, and were deposed. Houston died in Huntsville in 1863, 
of a broken heart. During his administration Col. John 
P. Smith and myself were in Austin on private business. 
We both voted against secession and were enthusiastic ad- 
mirers of the Governor. On his invitation, Peter and 
I spent several days in the executive office in the old 
Capitol. He saw that we loved him, and even greatness 
covets admiration. He was a born ruler of men, over six 




A. G WALKER 



feet two inches tall, straight as an arrow and modeled like 
a kingly Adonis. He was kind and considerate to all, 
especially so to young men; dressed plainly, wore a broad- 
brim wool hat, with a fawnskin waistcoat and walked with 
cane of his own making. He was an inveterate whittler, 
and presented W. B. Tucker and myself with souvenirs of 
his handiwork. He was a great admirer of Gen. Andrew 
Jackson, his political father, whom I well remember, hav- 



14 EARLY DAYS OF FORT WORTH. 

ing been presented to him by my grandfather in 1845, the 
year he died. My grandfather was a Whig, and an army 
contractor in the war of 1812. He would never silently 
hear Jackson abused, saying that "patriotism ranks poli- 
tics." 

Gen. Houston belonged to the Baptist Church, and in look- 
ing at this grand, benevolent and godlike man, it was not 
hard to realize that he traveled 700 miles from his Indian 
home to cane Congressman Stanberry in Washington, who 
had slandered him, and this with the consent of a Tennessee 
delegation, including James K. Polk, afterward President. 



Tarrant County Seat Fight. 

These were the halcyon days of young manhood to Peter 
Smith and myself, both being of the same age. We were in 
Austin when the Fort Worth and Birdville County seat 
question, thought to be settled, was again sprung by Col. 
A. G. Walker, Senator from this county. Walker was a 
client of mine, a native of Virginia, and came to Peter's 
Colony from Kentucky. He had been a school teacher and 
district surveyor; a good citizen, though pertinacious even 
to stubbornness; he never surrendered nor yielded a point. 
Dr. J. W. Throckmorton of Collin County, afterward Gov- 
ernor, was Fort Worth's leading friend in the House. This 
question had cost the life of more than one good man, and 
the State in legislation, $30,000. When the question was 
sprung I was booked for a masquerade ball and was to 
personify a Franciscan monk. I was adapted for that roll, 
having even then a clearing on my head, and my rotund 
figure was suggestive of a monastic life. But, hearing 
from Peter that the county question was to be heard that 
night by the joint committee, the ball as to me was rele- 
gated, and Peter and I delved into a cart full of legis- 
lative papers from this county and held up the hands of our 
noble leader, M. T. Johnson against Walker and Dr. B. F. 
Barclay. The committee sat nearly all night and reported 
a compromise bill involving another election, which event- 
uated in locating the county seat permanently at Fort 
Worth. Requiescat in pace! 



LOOKING BACKWARD 15 

M. T. Johnson was the father of Tarrant County, as E. 
M. Daggett was the father of Fort Worth, his face being on 
our city seal. Both were grand men physically, morally 
and mentally. The former weighed 225 pounds, the latter 
275. Johnson was physically the strongest man I ever 
knew. Neither of them was exemplary or saintly, yet both 
were to us old settlers veritable heroes. We loved 
them for the manifold good they did, and long years ago 
have buried their foibles. Both were good Masons. 

After all the pains historians take, how imperfect their 
labors ! Take these two men and Jonas Harrison, for whom 
Harrison County was named. Neither is mentioned in the 
"Encyclopedia of the New Southwest," nor in "The In- 
dian Wars and Pioneers of Texas." A lesson to us old ones 
of today, who should continue to hew to the line, and if 
the future names us commendably, well; if not, we are in 
good compaFiy. 



Local Government After War. 
Just after the close of our Civil War, far more cruel and 
devastating than other wars, we of Tarrant, like all other 
counties, were without any local form of government what- 
ever. From former decisions and from the very nature of 
things, we knew that de facto government existed with us, 
but the people at large were unsettled as to our exact legal 
status. For instance, marrying people wanted to know 
that a license issued by a de facto county clerk was indeed 
and in truth valid. A mistake might be horrible, and might 
be irremediable. Civil law must obtain. It was a ques- 
tion of bread and meat to us attorneys. By the reconstruc- 
tion laws of Congress nearly all the intelligence of the 
country was barred from office and disfranchised, hence 
we were restricted to the aged and carpetbaggers. So, at 
the instance of several good people, Edward Hovenkamp of 
Birdville, who had been District Attorney in war times, and 
I went to Austin, and there we two held an election 
and named a full set of county officers. Arriving in Austin, 
I saw Provisional Gov. A. J. Hamilton, my brother's old 
law partner, who left Texas in 1861, and was made a Briga- 



16 EARLY DAYS OF FORT WORTH. 

dier General in the Union Army, but never saw active serv- 
ice. In 1859 he was elected to Congress over Gen. Thomas N. 
Waul, who organized Waul's Legion. Texas was then en- 
titled to but two members of Congress. Both were fine orat- 
ors, the former a rough, the latter a finished ashler. Hamilton 
was, by a few votes, beaten for Speaker of the House by Gen. 
N. P. Banks, who at Mansfield and Brashear City, La., we 
called our "Confederate Quartermaster of subsistence." 
Gov. Hamilton gave me a pencil note to his provisional Sec- 
retary of State, Judge James Bell, whom I well knew. He 
was a native Texan and had been on the Supreme Bench. 
We handed the note to Judge Bell, he at once asked for a 
list of names for appointment. We retired and returned 
him a list. The next morning the Judge handed me the 
commissions, signed and sealed. Among them were County 
Judge Stephen Terry, County Clerk G. Nance, District 
Clerk Louis H. Brown, who was an aged man, his wife 
being Miss Patterson of Maryland, sister-in-law of Jerome 
Bonaparte, brother of the great Napoleon. Mr. Brown was 
an elegant, hospitable gentleman of the old school. He 
came here in 1858 with an accomplished family and a few 
negroes and settled on Marine Creek. His son, Horatio, 
was a member of my company. 



^ .^?>^ 
W^"^ 




JAMES GRIMSLEY 



"THERE WERE GIANTS IN THOSE DAYS"— E. M. 
DAGGETT AND REV. M. MATTHEWS. 



"All nations have a patron saint, and every State its 
heroes." 

The early settlers of Northwest Texas were not without 
great men. I recall the names of Captain Ephriam M. 
Daggett and Dr. Mansell Matthews. Both were large men, 
each weighing about 275 pounds. Both were intellectually 
great, and were born leaders of men. The face of the for- 
mer appears upon our city seal, placed there in 1873. Dag- 
gett was born in Canada and died here in 1883. He was 
the leading citizen and one of the founders of Fort Worth. 
He lived on block B 6, between Main and Houston streets, 
where he dispensed a feudal hospitality, and where, in 
1855, at General Sam Houston's request, he dressed, with 
his own hands, that old hero's leg that was wounded at 
the battle of San Jacinto, using the silver basin which Dag- 
gett captured from General Santa Anna at the battle of 
Buena Vista, and which Mrs. Josephine Ryan now owns. 
He loved our Union, and in 1883 came from near Niagara 
Falls to the site of Chicago, Illinois, with his mother and 
his brothers, Henry and Charles, and Mrs. W. M. McKee, 
all of whom, aged and respected, died in this county. He 
came to the Republic of Texas in 1840. A Unitarian in 
belief, he loved the "Mother Church," and gave to the Catho- 
lics the land upon which their stone church building stands. 
He was captain of a company of Texas volunteers in the 
Mexican war, and served with distinction with Colonel 
(Captain) Jack Hayes, whom I knew in 1852 in San Fran- 
cisco. In 1861 he voted for the ordinance of secession, 
which carried in Tarrant County by a majority of only 
27 out of 800 voted polled ; D. C. Dade and M. T. Johnson 
being defeated, and Nathaniel Terry (formerly Lieutenant 
Governor of Alabama), and Josiah Cook, of Birdville, being 
elected delegates to the State Convention which deposed 
Governor Sam Houston and passed the ordinance of seces- 
sion. 



'■THERE WERE GIANTS IN THOSE DAYS." 



19 



Dr. Mansell Matthews was a highly educated physician, 
of courtly presence, a Christian preacher without a superior 
in all our Southland. He had been County Judge of Red 
River County, and President of the Board of Land Com- 
missioners. He and Daggett belonged to the Masonic 
chapter here, and were bosom friends. Matthews was a 
Union man, too outspoken for his personal safety. He was 
a veritable patriarch of the olden times, and annually trav- 
eled with his family, some forty in number, including 
slaves, camping out, from Red River County to near Aus- 
tin, some 250 miles. There were no Indians and few 
fences to obstruct his march. He would return in the 
Spring with the rising of grass, with flock and herd. He 
practiced his profession, but seldom charged for services. 
His was a nomadic nature, and when on the move his outfit 
was like a caravan of the great desert. People came from 
thirty to forty miles to hear him expound the Word and re- 
ceive his advice. /\bove all, his genial good nature built up 
and strengthened the Christian order all along the frontier. 
He was not a politician ; loved the South, but made no secret 
of his Union sentiments. As sectional hatred intensified, 
the doctor's real trouble commenced. We then had a civil 
government in Texas, which existed only in name. The 
criminal law was as much in the hands of vigilance com- 
mittees as was that of China in the hands of the Boxers; 
but I must say it was rarely abused. It would not do for 
the South to be torn by internal dissentions. She 
could not afford to guard Valandighams with troops needed 
at the front. The high vigilance committee court was held 
in Gainesville, Cook County, and Dr. Matthews was, by 
its capias, imprisoned there for trial, charged with treason 
to the Confederate States of America. Constant Dodson 
presided as judge. The "Overt Act" clause concerning 
treason, in the State Constitution, had been changed by 
legislative action, by law of December 14, 1863, making 
convictions easier by new definitions of the crime. The 
penalty was death, and few accused escaped. Over a score 



20 EARLY DAYS OF FORT '\^ ORTH. 

of his fellow-prisoners, no more guilty than himself, were 
hung near and in plain view of his prison, on an elm tree. 
Daggett got word from Matthews, and, obeying his "mark," 
appeared before the terrible tribunal in his behalf; told 
them that Matthews had committed no overt act of trea- 
son; that his heart was with the South, his mind with the 
North ; that if they hung Matthews they must hang him, 
too. Matthews was acquitted of the death penalty, but 
punished by imprisonment for three days, and he was, by 
way of further punishment, to receive no word of his ac- 
quittal during that time. Daggett was allowed to see the 
prisoner, but only in the presence of the death guard, and 
was strictly enjoined not to tell the prisoner of the action 
of the court. Daggett, however, determined that Dr. 
Matthews should know that his life was saved, and told 
him so in this way. He talked for over two hours on the 
subject of death, the immortality of the soul, of repent- 
ance, faith, predestination, and especially on the absolute 
necessity of baptism by immersion as a condition precedent 
to salvation, etc., etc., etc. This was an unheard of thing 
for Daggett to do, and his distressed friend wondered what 
he meant. Of course, Matthews' nerves were strung, and 
he was intensely on the qui vive, knowing that something 
ulterior was meant by Daggett. Now the guard, from the 
long, dry talk on the Bible, became listless and inattentive, 
when Daggett asked Matthews what verse in the Bible 
afforded him the greatest comfort at this time, and in turn 
Matthews asked Dagget the same question, to which Dag- 
get replied : "Fret not thy gizzard, and frizzle not thy 
whirligig, thou, soul, art saved." Matthews asked him to 
give chapter and verse of the quotation, which, of course, 
he could not do. After some other conversation the doc- 
tor asked him to repeat the verse, the doctor significantly 
bowing his head, knowing that his life was saved, but 
that his friend was forbidden to tell him so. He slept 
soundly that night. Daggett remained in Gainesville three 
days, and restored Matthews to his family on Deer Creek, 
in this county. The above incident I had from the lips of 
both parties." 




EDWARD HOVENKAMP. 



PRANKS OF LAWYERS— AFTERWARDS JUDGE J. W. 
FERRIS AND COL. JOHN C. M'COY. 



"Should auld acquaintance be forgot, 

And never thought upon, 
The flames of love extinguish'd 

And freely past and gone?" 

A copy of Hartley's Digest, a lignumvitae inkstand, pen 
and handle, a good mustang and lariat — these were neces- 
sary implements of trade for an attorney-at-law in Texas 
in the fifties. The three-ring circus with clown attachment 
would cease to attract if it had every month in the year. 
Our great times were few. District Court held only twice 
a year, and the great time was the annual coming together 
of attorneys at Austin when the legislature and the Su- 
preme Court were in session at the same time. Then, too, 
we had business at the general land office, now nearly func- 
tus ofiicio. Nearly all traveled by private conveyance, 
stage-coach conveniences being limited to a few favored 
localities. The great stage artery of Texas north and south 
passed through Sherman, McKinney, Dallas, Waxahachie, 
Waco, Austin and San Antonio, 

Colonel John C. McCoy of Dallas in 1857 was District 
Attorney of the old Sixteenth Judicial District. Mac was 
a large, jovial m.an, a good lawyer, and the very prince of 
good fellows; a practical joker, a firm believer, though un- 
attached. J. W. Ferris of Waxahachie was one of the best 
attorneys in the state, a man of finished education and ad- 
dress, tall and slender, of Pharaoh's lean kine, and was 
extremely nervous. He was a man of staid dignity and was 
a member of the "Church South." He it was v/ho rendered 
the famous International & Great Northern railroad de- 
cision, having been appointed by Governor Coke because of 
an evenly divided supreme bench. 

In the early days the visiting bar arrived on horseback 
in Weatherford one hot Saturday evening and bathed in the 



PRANKS OP LAWYERS. 23 

Clear Fork just north of Carter's mill. Roses and ferns 
lined the banks and the water was beautifully clear— a dry 
branch there now. 

McCoy and Ferris were warm personal friends, though 
wholly unlike each other. McCoy that evening was in 
high glee, and gathering the resisting naked Ferris in his 
strong arms, proceeded to give an anatomical lecture, using 
Ferris as a subject, commencing at the frontis and ending 
at the pedal extremities, Ferris wriggling and exclaiming 
in vain, '^Unhand m.e, sir! I will hold you personally respons- 
ible," etc. Governor Throckmorton, Nat M. Burford, Char- 
ley De Morsa, M. Hawkins, Amaziah Bradshaw, John C. 
Easton, John j. Good, Joe Carroll and others enjoyed the 
fun. 

The following winter Colonel McCoy, journeying from 
Dallas to Austin in a large Concord coach one cold winter 
night, arrived in Waxahachie. It was pitch dark and the 
coach v/as full, but Ferris managed in the dark to crowd 
into a seat just opposite to McCoy, their knees touching. 
He did not recognize his tormentor of last spring. Several 
times when the wheels would run over rocks or ruts McCoy 
would cry out in pain, violently rubbing his knees. After 
awhile Ferris being nervous, became uneasy, and exclaim- 
ed "Sir, you seem to be quite nervous." Mac answered 
with an ugly word, "Anyone would be nervous to have 
two daggers pierce his knees." The Judge indignantly 
stopped the coach and took a seat on the outside with the 
driver. At the breakfast-stop he recgnized his tormenter 
and resumed his seat inside. He forgave, but never for- 
got. 

* * * 

The judge often played even with Mac. On one occa- 
sion they were leading counsel on opposite sides of an im- 
portant land case. Mac was for the plaintiff, and gave as 
his thought the statutory three days' written notice of 
his intention to read his several muniments of title in evi- 
dence. In a list of several conveyances he had omitted one. 
After consuming several hours in reading his title papers, 
Mac offered in evidence the omitted deed. Ferris objected 



24 EARLY DAYS OF FORT WORTH. 

and of course was sustained by the court. Turning, and 
politely bowing to Mac, Ferris said: "My jokes, though 
practical, are strictly legal and always pay." Of course 
the plaintiff broke down, but on payment of costs was grant- 
ed a new trial, 

"A little nonsense now and then 
Is relished by the wisest men." 
Just after the Civil War, when the country was full of 
cattle, then in great demand, the hotel, here in Fort 
Worth, was full of cattle buyers from the North, with lots 
of money. Strangers to us they were and to each other, 
waiting for the grass to rise. They were an uncommuni- 
cative set and all dressed with the regulation six-shooter. 
There were only three home boarders at the hotel — Ben 
Bedford, Walter A. Huffman and myself. Judge Ferris 
spent a few days at the hotel preparing his cases for Dis- 
trict Court commencing the following Monday. He had 
just returned from his first trip North, and day after day 
at the dinning table recounted over and over to admiring 
listeners his impressions of Niagara Falls and so forth. 
One day at dinner with an effort I got the f^oor first and told 
the Judge that I, too, had just returned from a trip from 
inside the enemy's lines, that when I got to Galveston I. 
rode on a great squatty coach that ran on iron rails and 
about fifty people were hauled on it by two small mules. 
The Judge, talking from his boots, remarked: "Yes, yes — 
street car." I answered, "Yes, that is what they called it." 
Continuing, I told him that returning home 1 missed the 
connection at Louisville and stopped over at the Gault 
House, that they took me into a little room, carpeted, and 
with a sofa in it, that a man pulled a rope and, up, up I went 
without a jar. The Judge remarked, "An elevator." I 
answered "Yes, that is what they called it." Continuing, I 
told him that a man lit a match on sand-paper on the wall 
in the dark hall and unwound a piece of iron like a coffee- 
mill handle, touched the lighted match to it, and behold, 
from the very iron sprang a most brilliant light. The Judge 
remarked, "That was gas." I remarked, as I rose hastily 
from the table, "Yes, Judge, that is exactly what they called 



PRANKS OF LAWYERS. 25 

it." As I retreated, those hitherto silent cowmen howled 
and howled. I got half way across the square before the 
Judge from the porch called me back. I tried to explain, 
but it wouldn't wash. 







J SAMUKL, .1. C. TKKK'KLL AND SAM WOOOV 



STORY OF REV. JOHN DENTON AFTER WHOM 
DENTON COUNTY, TEXAS WAS NAMED. 



Dr. Ash N. Denton died at his residence in Austin on 
the 6th instant. 

This announcement awakened memories long dormant. 
In 1858, while an orphan boy, Denton lived in Weather- 
ford. A saloonkeeper there, named Big Jim Curtis, 
abused him, a fight with revolvers ensued, resulting in 
Curtis' death. Denton obtained a change of venue and was 
tried and acquitted in Buchanan, then the county seat of 
Johnson County. Denton came to Fort Worth, where he 
was elected Justice of the Peace ; commenced readhis' law 
with A. Y. Fowler, but afterwards studied medicine with 
Dr. Calvin M. Peak, the son of Captain Peak, the Mexican 
war veteran of Dallas County, and graduated in Galveston 
medical school in 1861. Pie was married here to a most beau- 
tiful and accomplished lady, Miss Maggie Murchison, who 
survives him.. Pie located at or near San Marcos; from there 
he moved to Austin and took charge of the insane asylum 
as superintendent during Governor Ireland's two adminis- 
trations. In 1898, I with my two brothers, called on ex- 
Governor F. M. Lubbock, who v/as sick. Doctor Denton 
was his physician, and I saw him there for the last time. 

The following I state from mem.ory, told m^e by John C. 
McCoy, deceased, of Dallas. McCoy was surveyor of the 
Peters Colony company in the days of the Republic of 
Texas and was afterward District Attorney of the Six- 
teenth Judicial District. 

Denton County was named in honor of Captain John 
R. Denton, the father of Dr. Ash Denton. He was 
a most remarkable man, an attorney, a Methodist 
preacher and a distinguished Indian fighter; was killed 
by the Comanche Indians on Rush Creek, this county, 
near where the Texas and Pacific Railroad crosses that 
stream. McCoy said that he never heard his equal as an 
orator. For a frivolous cause he separated from his wife 



28 EARLY DAYS OF FORT WORTH. 

in Arkansas. She went to Fayetteville and there established 
a little millinery store. One night a merchant, a man of 
wealth and local influence, on attempting to enter her 
room, was shot and killed by Mrs. Denton. She was in- 
dicted for murder and imprisoned. It was generally thought 
that on account of the influence of the prosecution and of 
the desperado friends of the deceased Mrs. Denton would 
be convicted. On the day of the trial the court room was 
densely crowded with spectators. The presiding judge 
asked the defendant if she had an attorney to defend her. 
She answered: "No; I have no attorney and no friends." 
A stranger to all, sitting inside the bar arose, gazing in- 
tently into her face, said : "No, not without friends. If it 
please your honor, I will appear for the defendant, if ac- 
ceptable to her and to the court." 

She recognized her husband in the stranger, who, being 
unknown, exhibited his license to the court, and the trial 
proceeded. The facts were plain. Her counsel seemed ab- 
stracted and asked the prosecuting witnesses but few per- 
tinent questions. The State's attorney, an able advocate, 
made a strong eff'ort, and many trembled for the fate of 
the beautiful defendant. When he had finished his open- 
ing address Denton arose to reply. He discussed the lavv' 
of murder in its various degrees, and the law of self-defense 
as applicable to the evidence in the case. In manner he 
was as calm, cool and emotionless as if he were an ani- 
mated marble statue. But every point he made was as 
clear as the noonday sun, and he spoke as he shot — to the 
center every time. And his very impassiveness seemed to 
carry conviction. The first emotion he displayed was in 
his peroration, when, resting his eyes upon the defendant, 
he said in part: "Gentlemen of the Jury, look upon the 
defendant. Scan that pure face and behold something 
dearer to me than life, and more precious to me than all 
things else under the blue canopy of heaven. Need I tell 
you that she is my wife. I could as easily believe an angel 
guilty of crime as my wife. She never had an impure 
thought in her life. It is true that whilst no woman was 
ever gentler or more kind-hearted or more faithful and 



STORY OP REV. JOHN DENTON 29 

affectionate wife, she, with a courage born of virtue and 
innocence, slew the rufRan who would have desecrated my 
fireside. And for this worthy deed of a noble woman I 
honor and love her more than ever. Thank God for hav- 
ing blessed me with such a wife." 

Concluding, he advanced toward the defendant, and, ex- 
claimed: "No, not without a fyiend, little woman," and, 
extending his arms, "behold in me you have more than a 
friend — a husband!" 

She sprang to his breast amid the tears and acclaims of 
the people and the cries of the sheriff for "order in the 
cuort!" The jury, looking to the right and left and talking 
to each other, without leaving their box, returned instanter 
a verdict of "Not guilty." The friends of the prosecution 
were immediately conspicuous by their absence. 

Captain Denton and wife then moved to Clarksville, 
Texas. A full account of this trial was published over 
forty years ago by Charley De Morse in his Clarksville 
Standard. 







(;iDEOX NANCE. 
SixlL-en Years County Ck-rii 



WEATHERFORD, TEXAS IN THE RECONSTRUC- 
TION DAYS. 



"Lull'd in the countless chambers of the brain, 
Our thoughts are linked by many a hidden chain; 
Awake but one, and lo, what myriads rise! 
Each stamps its image as the other flies." 

A few days ago, accompanied by two dark horses and 
a number of friends interested in the Congressional con- 
vention I found myself in the court house at Weatherford, 
Texas, more liberal to Parker than to her other counties, 
gave her, at her organization in '56-7, a tract of land on 
which Weatherford is built, and with the proceeds of the 
sale of lots the county erected quite a handsome brick court 
house in the center of the public square, where the present 
more pretentious building stands. Our delegation sat in 
the center of the court room, and thus was brought "the 
light of other days around me." 

In the fall of 1859, within a few feet of this spot, there 
were suspended from the ceiling several rows of Indian 
scalps, with bows, shields, spears, etc., while under and 
around, to the time of sweet music, we traced the light 
fantastic in many mazy sets. John R. Baylor and his 
brother, George, with others, had whipped the Indians; 
these scalps, etc., were the proof, and cause of rejoicing, 
for Parker County was then often raided by Comanches. 
The Civil War ensued, when the frontier was never so 
well guarded. It was the least dangerous and most popu- 
lar service in the Confederacy. Provisional Governor A. 
J. Hamilton appointed R. W. Scott, of Johnson County, Dis- 
trict Judge. He held the first term of the District Court 
for Parker County after the close of the war, in the spring 
of 1866. H. H. Sneed was District Attorney, and David 
Yeary, foreman of the grand jury. The county officers 
were : W. Frank Carter, County Judge ; R. W. Duke, Coun- 
ty Clerk; Joseph W. Anderson, District Clerk; D. B. Luckey, 
Sheriff, and Dr. E. Milliken, Treasurer. The local attor- 



32 EARLY DAYS OF FORT WORTH. 

neys were: A. J. Hood, Daniel 0. Norton, H. S. Coleman, 
Simon Sugg, H. H. McLean, C. L. Jordan, A. J. Ball and R. 
,T. McKenzie. The visiting attorneys were Joe Carroll, J. C. 
Easton, Joe Rushing, John J. Goode, Joe Bledsoe, H, G. 
Hendricks, Ed. Hovenkamp, J. C. Terrell and M. Hawkins. 

Under the advice of that great and good man. General 
Sam Houston, peace and plenty reigned in Texas during 
the war. Not so in the divided border States. During the 
whole struggle criminal laws were uninterruptedly admin- 
istered ; the laws of limitation were by legislative enact- 
ment suspended between the 28th day of January, 1861, 
and the 13th day of March, 1870. True, in some sections 
vigilance committees, composed, as a rule, of the very best 
elderly men, existed. Having neither money, credit nor 
manufactories, the people were in a primitive condition. 
Health, courage and hope were left. Horses and cattle 
upon a thousand hills she had. These could walk to market. 
Then, too, she had free grass and no taxation. Soon better 
times dawned. The dream which said, "Arise, Peter, slay 
and eat," to him a convenient dream, was to our people 
a glorious reality. Thousands of unbranded and unclaimed 
cattle abounded. Even boys ran branding irons with mar- 
velous success. 

Soon there was a general desire to resume the reign of 
law and order. Norton was appointed Judge of the Six- 
teenth Judicial District, which embraced Parker County. 
He was an old editor, an intelligent, good man, but an indiff- 
erent lawyer. He swore in 1844 that he would not shave 
his face until Henry Clay was elected president, and kept 
his oath. He loved Texas, and was good to Confederate 
prisoners in Ohio, and this atoned for many sins. He made 
a good officer for the times, which were queer, peculiar 
and without precedent. At Norton's first term in Weather- 
ford a Federal lieutenant and a squad of men camped on the 
hill west of Carson & Lewis' hotel. The Indians gave some 
trouble then, and killed a man on the Clear Fork, between 
Weatherford and Fort Worth ; hence the attorneys went 
from Fort Worth in a body. I remember the following: 
M. Hawkins, Henry Sneed, J. C. Easton, E. Hendricks, G. 



WEATHER FORD, TEXAS. 33 

A. Everetts and Ed. Hovenkamp. The officers then in Par- 
ker were Sam Milliken, who was both District and County 
Clerk; Wes Hendricks, Sheriff; Joe Wilbarger, County 
Judge, and H. H. Sneed, District Attorney. The local at- 
torneys were Charley Jordan, of Lynchburg, Va. ; A. J. 
Ball, of Kentucky; A. J. Hood, E. W. Hughes, Joe Wol- 
folk and S. W. T. Lanham. I remember being one of a 
committee of attorneys who examined Lanham in open 
court on his application for license, and then predicted that 
he would some day be Governor of Texas. His moral char- 
acter was so good, his manners so genial, and his answers 
to questions so prompt and clear, caused us all to love 
him, who was then the "kid of the bar." 

Uncle Jimmy Jones, God bless him, was presiding elder 
of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South, and on the Sun- 
day preceding court held forth in Ike McConnell's long, 
dirt-floor school house, located north of the square. Lan- 
ham, a devout member of Uncle Jimmy's church, caused the 
visiting bar to attend the meeting. We sat together. Uncle 
Jimmy took for his text, "Woe unto you, lawyers, hypo- 
crites;" and instead of applying the text to the house of 
Levi — his own cloth — he applied it to us attorneys, him- 
self having had a good time "enduring the war." He want- 
ed no courts, and was in favor of the status quo. Note the 
effect of that sermon! The next day a number of young 
men, ex-Confederate soldiers, assembled with Enfield rifles 
on the hill north of town and bombarded the court house 
square, causing many to hug the south side of the court 
house. Fortunately no one was hurt. 

There was little or no money in the country. I remem- 
ber collecting a good fee in peltry, buffalo and other hides, 
which our merchants had no trouble in exchanging for 
money. 

Weatherford has good water, from the same sandstone 
form^ation that furnishes our supply, but needs water works 
sadly. Abounding in good church buildings, schools and 
residences, with enterprise her future is assured. She has 
given to Texas our Sam Lanham, and George Clark, now of 
Waco. May her new generation do as well ! 



THE ONLY TWENTY DOLLAR FELONY BOND. 



No one served the people of Texas with greater honor 
to the State and himself, as Supreme Judge and Governor, 
than did the old Alcalde, O. M. Roberts. To some extent 
he possessed the genius of the great Napoleon in selecting 
his lieutenants. Among them was John D. Templeton, his 
Attorney General, a young man of unusual dignity, with a 
fine legal mind. 

It was my good fortune, in 1869, to meet young Temple- 
ton in his first case. It was in an examining court in Tar- 
rant County, Texas, James Grimley, Justice. The old prac- 
tice of "taking" cattle was fast playing out. Defendant 
owned no cattle but had collected and sold several small 
herds; was arrested in possession of some forty head, to 
which he could show no bill of sale. It was a hot spring 
day. The examination was held in a grove, was largely 
attended, and nearly every man had his shotgun. It looked 
squally for the defendant, who paid me all his money, except 
a twenty dollar gold piece, and gave me a written promise 
for a set of house logs. 

The state proved adverse ownership as to only one animal, 
a crumpled horn work steer, worth ten dollars, and the de- 
fendant was held to answer for the theft of that animal — a 
felony charge. The question was as to the amount of bail, 
I contended with simulated gravity that the court should 
fix the bond at double the amount of the value of that steer ; 
read from the Federal and State Constitutions as to "ex- 
cessive bail," and from the Statute laws on amounts of 
bonds in attachment and sequestration cases — double the 
value in litigation. Uncle Jimmy declared that he once had 
an attachment case before him and that he would hear evi- 
dence as to the value of the steer. All hands adjourned to 
the yard, where "Aunt Jane" had prepared a good dinner 
of jerked beef, bread and buttermilk. Court resumed busi- 
ness and fixed the amount of the bond at twenty dollars. 
The house logs were delivered, and made me a smokehouse. 
The defendant was finally acquitted. 



iij«iiiii_miMii^i(iu|jni»ii|«i 



inwiiiiniiiijiipfliljUPII 




^ftfi^^fi^ 



SAM WOODY 
HOWARD I>EAK 



E. S TERRELL 
C. TERRELL 



RICHARD KING 
DAN PARKER 



WHY SAM WOODY LOCKED HIS WAGON WHEELS 
EVERY NIGHT. 



During the period of reconstruction in Texas, returning' 
to Fort Worth from, I think, the last term of the District 
Court of Johnson County that was held at Buchanan, and ar- 
riving at Nolan River, I saw, newly camped there, Sam 
Woody, of Deep Creek, Wise County. He had about ten 
yokes of oxen, two or three horses, and two large wagons, 
which were loaded with goods en route to Fort Worth from 
Calvert, 200 miles distant, but then our nearest railroad 
depot. 

The weather was warm and the moon being full, I pre- 
ferred traveling at night, but accepting Sam's pressing in- 
vitation, spent the night with him; so, stripped my horse 
and picketed him with the others. 

There was not on all the frontier, a bigger soul or a more 
companionable man than Sam Woody. One of the first set- 
tlers of Wise County, he was raised in the mountains of 
Tennessee, a neighbor of Governor Bob Taylor. He was 
fond of the good things of this life, and at home, as in camp, 
lived like a prince ; a man of great piety, his word was his 
bond. Fond of joking, he never descended to the vulgar, 
and never exaggerated. Nearly everybody knew him and 
he was universally beloved. 

I noticed that the wheels of his wagons were locked, and 
asked his negro man the reason. He said he didn't know; 
that Mass' Sam made him lock the wheels every night, 
but 'twas mighty strange. Just before passing off to sleep 
my eyes again caught sight of the locked wheels and of 
an old horseshoe nailed to the wagon box. This suggested 
superstition in the owner, that some mysterious connection 
existed between the horseshoe and the locked wheel. What 
was it? All men are more or less superstitious, but moun- 
taineers, sailors and frontiersmen are especially so. With- 
out doubt it is caused by solitude, and for the same cause, 
I take it, such men as Napoleon and Cromwell, compelled 



WHY SAM WOODEY LOCKED HIS WAGON WHEELS. 37 

to mental isolation, became superstitious. Reflecting thus, 
while listening to the heavy breathing of the oxen, the crow- 
ing of plover and the barking of coyotes, Sam leisurely 
arose, stretched himself and refilled his pipe. At risk of 
giving offense I asked why he locked his wheels. Edgar 
Poe asked questions of the raven and answered them him- 
self. Perhaps I would have to do the same thing. But I 
was consumed with curiosity. With rather an embarrassed 
look, after an uproarious laugh, he said in substance : 

"Cap, just before the war I went down to Fort Worth 
with a load of wheat for Field & Man's gristmill, above the 
blue hole on Clear Fork, and loaded back with domestic, 
sugar, coffee and one thing and another. A hired man — a 
tenderfoot — was with me. Seeing that he was getting too 
full I told him to go to camp across the river, above the 
junction, and to yoke the oxen to the wagon, and that I 
would be along directly. He wanted to take the jug, but 
I retained that in my hand. In an hour or so I went over 
to the camp. Well, sir, that fellow had hitched up the team, 
loaaed the mess tricks, got up in the wagon, went to sleep, 
and away the whole chebang marched for Deep Creek. Left 
Vv^ith that jug of whisky I was in a fix. It was a full moon, 
like this. I walked over ten miles before I stopped them, 
and every mile I swore in good earnest, always hereafter 
to lock my wheels. When that fellow woke up he said, 'Well, 
you've come at last?' 

"You see. Cap, not being a Catholic, there is no way for 
me to be absolved from them oaths." I told him that I 
thought he was wrong. He replied that Bro. W. G. Veal also 
told him so, but that the Bible says, "Thou shalt make thy 
prayer unto him, and thou shalt pay thy vows." 






THE FORT WORTH UNIVERSITY. 



I was on my way to Virginia, when I met Rev. A. A. 
Johnson, at that time preaching the gospel and the tenets 
of John Wesley Methodism in Texas. He said that he had 
been preaching for two years without a convert, yet he de- 
sired to do something for the church by which he could 
pay back to it the debt he owed for his education as a min- 
ister of the gospel. The Methodist Episcopal church had 
just determined to establish the third of its trinity of edu- 
cational institutions in the South, the other two having been 
planted at Chattanooga and Little Rock. He was earnest 
in the belief that Fort Worth could secure the prize. Why 
don't you incorporate, I asked him, and not long afterward 
he came to my office and I drew up the charter. 

A few days later I met William H. Cannon, a traveling 
salesman, and a devout member of the Methodist church, 
and explained the plan to him, telling him of a piece of land 
forty acres in extent, in front of my home property that 
could be bought. Captain John Hanna was the agent for 
the land, and I advised Johnson to buy it. 

The deal was made, and Johnson and Cannon sold enough 
lots off that forty acres to clear up about $4,000 apiece. 
They reserved the balance for the campus, gave it to the 
University and on it the buildings of the institution have 
been erected. The property thus donated is worth now in 
the neighborhood of $150,000. 

Following the incorporation of the company to build the 
University, the people here raised $10,000 to help the project 
along. Captain Lloyd gave $700, Joe Brown $500, W. J. 
Boaz $500, Peter Smith $500 and others equal amounts. 
The church put in $10,000 and when the building was com- 
pleted a debt of $3,000 had been incurred. This the educa- 
tional association of the general church paid off, and since 
that time the University has not been encumbered. I have 
educated five children at the institution. The pictures of 
Johnson and Cannon hang on the walls of the chapel in 
grateful remembrance of the services they performed for 
the University. 



NATHANIEL TERRY. 



He came to Tarrant County in 1854. He had been the 
Democratic nominee for Governor in Alabama, defeated 
by Governor Jones, his brother-in-law, in a three-cor- 
nered race. At that time Lieutenant Governors in Ala- 
bama were elected by the State Senate. He was twice elect- 
ed Lieutenant Governor. His defeat for Governor, by an 
independent candidate, probably made him the strict parti- 
san that he was. His wife, nee Jones, was a refined, edu- 
cated and lovely woman. Two daughters and two sons, 
with some thirty-six negroes, constituted the family. These 
slaves were given to Mrs. Terry by her brother, for the 
Colonel had failed in business, and eighty of his slaves were 
sold by the Sheriff under execution. The Colonel had 
been one of the highest flyers in the Union. Among 
his assets was Uncle Daniel, his body servant, keeper and 
rider of Ringgold, a famous horse costing him $3,000. Dan- 
iel, with Ringgold, won a great race at Saratoga, when it 
was safe for a Southern man to travel with his slaves 
through the North without John Brown's interference. This 
horse was named after Ringgold, commander of the fa- 
mous battery which did famous service in Mexico. The 
horse was a deep sorrel, with heavy mane and tail, and in 
motion he was a poem. Even at this day I occasionally 
see the favor of the descendants of this grand horse in this 
country. 

Colonel Terry settled the H. C. Holloway place north- 
east of this city in 1854. He bought this land from M. T. 
Johnson. He was a pronounced secessionist, and in 1862 
sold his farm to David Snow, an anti-secessionist, for $10,- 
000,which he took in Confederate money in preference to 
gold coin offered him. In 1863 the Confederate Con- 
gress compelled the funding of this money into bonds, and 
I fell heir to the same in an iron safe which I bought from 
Captain M. B. Loyd — the bonds worthless, of course. 
David Snow, under a dirt floor in the rear of No. 109 Weath- 



4J EARLY DAYS OF FORT WORTH. 

erford street in this city, buried $10,000 in gold coin, which 
he resurrected in 1866. He married a Miss Bradley, daugh- 
ter of the founder of Camden, Ark., and died there. He 
was a shoemaker by trade, and made his money by mer- 
chandising. 

The Colonel's house consisted of a row of several rooms 
snow white and well furnished, facing the south, fronted 
with a porch with floors of stone. There were separate 
apartments for the aged couple. He kept the most hospita- 
ble home I ever knew. When Governor Houston, Jack 
iiamilton, M. P. Wall, A. W. Terrell and other noted men 
visited the village no one dreamed that they would go to 
the hotel. Colonel Terry entertained them, as of course, and 
their friends also. 

Utterly ruined by the result of the war, this aged couple 
died here about the same time. Like Cicero, the Colonel 
loved and served his country, and lost all by espoushig a 
lost cause. 



—>•■:-«• >-i—;-< •>-•<-► 



OLD PAUL TYLER AND HIS DOG "SOUNDER." 



The early settlers of Tarrant County were native Ameri- 
cans, almost without exception. As a rule they were pious 
people, for I cannot recall an irreligious family. The few 
merchants carried heavy stocks ; credit extended for a year, 
was almost universal, and was rarely abused. A whole 
chapter by contrast, is contained in this declaration. 

The good effects of the Act of August 26, 1856, opening 
Peters' Colony to pre-emption and settlement, were im- 
mediately felt. The Neighborhood of Clarksville, Tennes- 
see, furnished many emigrants, among others, A. D. John- 
son, Paul Isbell, James K. Allen, Stephen Terry, James 
Grant, Jack Collier, the Hagoods, R. H. and William King, 
the Pettyes, John Weims, John Ingraham, C. G. Payne and 
Paul H. Tyler, with their servants and household goods, 
settled in and near Fort Worth. 

Paul Tyler was of FalstafRan proportions; weighed 225 
pounds, a genial bachelor, over 60 years old. He had been the 
stay and support of his mother and sisters in Tennessee. Sur- 
viving them, he followed his friends and neighbors to Texas. 
His was a blighted existence. He worshipped Nature and 
loved the primeval forest, and usually hunted alone. With his 
gun and rod he was a welcomed inmate of every family. His 
appearance was ever welcomed, especially by children, 
whom he dearly loved. His departure caused protest and 
insistence of early return. But after all, Paul's best friend 
was his faithful dog, old Sounder, an immensely large Vir- 
ginia dearhound, a regular blackand tan, large muzzle, a 
little pepper and salt color on the breast and tip of his tail. 
He had a deep trailing voice, like the music of distant thun- 
der, oft-repeated. Few realize the importance of a good 
dog in a new country. Suppose for a moment that the spe- 
cies had not existed ; how could man, without the assistance 
of the dog, have been able to conquer, tame and reduce to 
servitude every other animal. How could he discover, chase 
and destroy those that were noxious to him. In order for 



42 EARLY DAYS OF FORT WORTH. 

him to become master, it was necessary for him to begin 
by making friends of a part of them, to attach such of them 
to himself by kindness as seemed fittest for obedience and 
pursuit. Thus the first art employed by man was in con- 
ciliating the favor of the dog, and the fruits of this art 
were the conquest and peaceful possession of the earth. 
The ancients deified tne dog. God created Sounder a deer- 
hound of the purest breed. Paul traced his pedigree through 
Cumberland Gap to James Kennerly's kennel, in Patrick 
County, Virginia, near Mayoforge. 

In 1859, wnen Lawrence Steel moved to the White Settle- 
ment, Paul and faithful Sounder went, too. More than hu- 
man love existed between them. Let one of us go to the 
door, or on the porch, and no Sounder; but let Paul go, and 
lo, Sounder was there. He fed him on cold, unsalted corn- 
bread, a little peppered. Paul never ate without remem- 
bering Sounder. Tlcie understanding between them was 
wonderful. Was a hog to be caught Sounder stood mute and 
inattentive until Paul spoke, and then success immediately 
followed obedience. Damon and Pythias could have loved 
no more. Old Paul's human loves were dead. God gave 
the old man Sounder to compensate. 

One day Sounder was missed. They heard him trailing 
on the Toombs and Catlett land. The next day Sounder 
was heard on the trail, and woodmen reported him an hour 
behind a big buck. That night he came home apparently 
fagged out, but by sunup of the third day he was on the trail 
and the woodcutters reported Sounder in sight. By 3 o'clock 
he bayed the buck in water at the mouth of Silver Creek, 
where Paul killed it. Mr. Steel again moved; this time to 
Parker County. Paul and Sounder went, too, and died there 
near Veals Station. Scientists cannot tell us the line be- 
tween instinct and intelligence. Certainly Sounder had a 
spark of intelligence which is immortal. 

I believe that Paul and Sounder are reunited in the hunt- 
er's Elysium, where Sounder leads the pack, and has dog 
days to spare. This twain, like Abelard and Heloise, de- 
serve a monument. 




C B. DAGGETT 

Owned the First Store in Tarrant Countv. 



MY FIRST HUNT IN TARRANT COUNTY. 



When a younger n:an I loved to hunt and fish. Diana and 
Izaak Walton were my patron saints. The fact is, my love 
for these sports had much to do with my locating in Fort 
Worth. The neighborhood of the Queen City of the Prairies 
was then the hunter's paradise. 

It was in February, 1857. The day was clear, cold and 
crisp. An ideal Texas midwinter day. Our hunting ground 
for the day lay in the woods bstween the "Fort" and Bird- 
ville. Deer were numerous; wild turkeys abounded in the 
bottom ; some herds of antelope yet survived on the prairies. 
The West Fork was over half-bank full, with some drift 
wood running; no bridge or ferry. So R. H. King and my- 
self went in a skiff down the river from near the site of the 
long bridge to the brickyard crossing east of town, so as 
to ferry over the hunters and recross from camp with game 
on hcme-coming. 

R. H. and William King, C. G. Payne, Paul Tyler and K. 
Coleman were of the party. R. H. King, now of this city, 
and then Master of our Masonic lodge, and myself, alone 
survive. 

I had a large shotgun, which chambered four "blue whis- 
tlers." When a few hundred yards below the town I stood 
up in the stern of the boat to better aim at some game, and 
"all accoutered as I was," fell overboard, holding on to my 
gun, turned a summersault in the bosom of the deep, saved 
the gun, and wrung out my clothes just above the Cold 
Spring; crossed the boys over and separated for the hunt. 
King and myself killed a fine buck and wounded another, 
near the Cross Spring, where Uncle Alsie Johnson planted 
the mint for juleps. Following the hounds, we found the 
wounded deer in the water at the foot of a steep bank, on 
the south side of the river, his nose and antlers only showing 
above the water. William King and myself swam across 
the river to the buck. King with knife in his mouth. To- 
gether we held the deer while King dispatched it. It was a 



MY FIRST HUNT IN TARRANT COUNTY. 45 

large buck, and we swam across the river with him between 
us, each holding a prong of his horns. I never had so cold 
a bath. 

In those days whisky was a necessary part of a camp out- 
fit. We had a good article of Robinson County "goods." 
The boys drenched us with a double "Timothy," and I felt 
none the worse for my double bath. No one doubted that 
Robinson County whisky was nectar for the gods. It is 
said the Primitive Baptists used it for sacramental purposes. 
It was delightfully, deliciously enjoyable and "like the dew 
of Hermon that ran down on Aaron's beard, even to the hem 
of his garments," it went dov\^n smoothly, spontaneously 
and without combustion, and was immediately felt to the 
end of the toes, permeating the whole human frame divine 
with a genial glow which must oe felt to be even remotely 
understood. They can make no more like that. And think 
of it! Only thirty cents a gallon, with a red corncob attach- 
ment. 

So long as the firm of "Coleman & Payne's" stock lasted, 
camp hunts were frequent if not profitable. The product 
was untaxed in those days of true Democracy. 

The decrees of the gods are inscrutable. The past is im- 
mutable! Who can tell! Some of us believe that if the 
State administration had used Robinson County whisky 
alone, the convicted Waters-Pierce Oil Com.pany monopoly 
would not be doing business in Texas. 



2^ %k^ 



A MOTHER'S LOVE— SWAPPING BABIES. 



Standing on the corner of First and Main streets, where 
Capt. J. C. Terrell, with the aid of a whipsaw, built his law 
office, 45 years ago, he remarked: "It was just 35 years 
ago that my oldest child, a girl, was born here. I was glad, 
but would have been gladder had it been a boy. 

"A few months later I was traveling with the young 
child and its mother, and spent a night at a small clearing 
in Hill County, where there was a young mother with a 
beautiful boy baby the age of my girl. The mother was 
washing under a willow tree, near a spring. Her Cupid 
crowing on a Mexican blanket spread on the grass. 

"I remarked to my wife in a stage whisper, "You know 
I wanted a boy ; let us swap children with this good woman. 
I will pay its mother, and the children will never know the 
difference. Wife agreed, and went off with our baby to the 
house. 

"Then I turned to the woman, exposing a handful of gold, 
and made the proposition to swap, offering more money on 
my return to Fort Worth. She turned leisurely around, de- 
posited the garment on the wash tub, removed the snuff 
stick from her mouth, stood at attention, with flushed cheeks, 
gazing intently into my eyes, remarked slowly, but with 
dignified emphasis: "Stranger, I would see you in hell 
first." 

Negotiations were indefinitely suspended. 







ROBT. TANAHILL, 
County Judg-e 



A SHORT SKETCH OF THOS. P. OCHILTREE. 



The gallant Major Thomas P. Ochiltree, who recently died 
in Virginia, was a son of William B. Ochiltree, a distinguish- 
ed jurist and one of the founders of the Republic of Texas, 
whither Tom came from Alabama, an infant. When quite 
a lad he was thrown from a horse, striking his head against 
a tree, and all of the past became to him a blank. He even 
had to relearn his A, B, C's. He had good tutors and favor- 
able surroundings and progressing rapidly, became at an 
early age a good Latin, Spanish and French scholar. It 
is believed that save the fathers of the Republic, no Texan 
was more widely known than Tom Ochiltree. He was 
truly sui generis, his life a romance. Comparing Tom with 
historic characters, whom he somewhat resembled, the name 
of "Beau" Hickman, who flourished in Washington City 
about the time of the Mexican War, and of "Beau" Brum- 
mell, of George IV time naturally recur; but he was a su- 
perior man to either of them, living in a more enlightened 
age, of gentle lineage, without the advantages possessed 
by them, a poor man, product of the Texas frontier, he con- 
sorted, in peace and in war, with the highest, as a social 
and intellectual equal, at home alike in palace and in cot- 
tage. 

I first met him in Austin, Texas, in the winter of '56-7, 
when he was sergeant-at-arms to the House of Representa- 
tives, and often reading clerk. He often called the roll from 
memory. He was an original secessionist and a menrbsr 
of the Charleston Convention that spoke the Civil War, 
himself, for one so young a leading actor. His disabilities 
of minority were removed by special act of the legislature 
of '57-8, so as to enable him to practice law. His father 
was his partner; an elderly man, who declined a place in 
President Davis' cabinet, thus making a way for Judge John 
H. Reagan. Tom served as a private soldier in Virginia, 
New Mexico and Louisiana and was for a long time on Gen- 
eral Dick Taylor's staff with the rank of major. He was 



A SHORT SKETCH OP PHOS. P. OCHILTREE. 49 

a good Confederate soldier; served as a mere boy in the 
Texas army against the Indians. 

Immediately after the surrender he was imprisoned on 
Johnson's Island, Lake Erie. Released, he went to Europe ; 
returning, became junior editor of the Houston Telegraph. 
In '66-7 I saw him in Austin. He asked me what I intended 
to do. I told him I would practice law. He answered, "There 
is no law practice. I am going North, where there is some 
life and lots of money." 

He aspired to be special correspondent of the New York 
Tribune and was strapped, as usual, but managed to get to 
New Orleans, where he stopped at the St. Charles, of course. 
There lived then in New Orleans a man named Moody, 
whose advertisements were as noted in Louisiana, Arkansas 
and Texas as the Famous Douglass shoe man is today. On 
every conspicuous place there appeared his sign, "Get your 

shirts at Moody's," "No. Canal street, New Orleans." 

And so, paying his last dollar for a cab, Tom went to 
Moody's. Remaining in the cab he sent for Mr. Moody, ex- 
hibited his commission as major on General Taylor's staff, 
introduced himself and went with Mr. Mody to his private 
office and there demanded his shirts. Mr. Moody sent for 
the head clerk, who informed him that the major had no 
shirts there; whereupon Tom said: "Mr. Moody, read that. 
I wrote it at my rooms at the St. Charles last night. You will 
observe, sir, that I get from you two trunks, loaded with 
everything pertaining to a gentleman's wardrobe, from a 
collar button to a cloak, and $50 in cash to pay my way to 
New York, and this is your advertisement, worth thou- 
sands of dollars." 

Mr. Moody carefully read, and after pondering profound- 
ly, replied: "Major, you are right. Select your trunks and 
clothing, and here is a fifty-dollar check." Now we find 
Tom in New York at the desk of Horace Greeley. He 
showed him his commission as major, told him his boy rec- 
ord as editor, and pledged his ability to forward the inter- 
ests of the Tribune at the World's Fair in Paris, and thanked 
him for his efforts in President Davis' behalf, the brother- 
in-law of his late chief. He further said that if his articles 



50 EARLY DAYS OF FORT WOhTH. 

were not received, to cast them into the waste basket and 
no charge would be made. Mr. Greeley wrote out and de- 
livered to him the coveted appointment, with which he hied 
him to the White House at Washington City and obtained 
from General Grant the classmate of General Taylor, a 
special pardon — one of the few granted by him, and which 
was afterwards questioned by President Johnson. General 
Grant also gave him a note to the Secretary of State to com- 
mend Major Ochiltree to our ministers in Europe as a 
worthy, gallant and meritorious citizen of the United States 
of America. Thus armed, he went to Mr. Greeley's banker 
in New York, where, on his own note, he borrowed $500. 
With all these documents he went to the passenger shipping 
oftices and found no difficulty in getting free passage to 
Paris. Some questions arose as to incidental expenses in- 
curred during the passage over, which we will not notice. 
He was a man of the world. His brains and knowledge 
of men his only capital invested. In Paris he engaged rooms 
near the American legation and advertised by a large gold 
sign reading thus: "Major Thomas P. Ochiltree, Special 
Correspondent of the New York Tribune." Then he is said 
to have made and spent many thousands. It is safe to say 
that there existed no better judge of horses and dogs than 
Tom Ochiltree. 

At that time, here in Fort Worth, we had a mail only once 
a week. I took the Tribune and eagerly read Tom's contri- 
butions, which ever sounded sporty and were easily recog- 
nized as genuine. He was an American brick. After the 
conclusion of the Paris fair he crossed the channel and was 
by our minister at St. James presented to Prince Albert, 
now King Edward. It seems that this Prince and Tom saw 
horses and dogs alike and there is no doubt they became 
chums, and often sailed together on the Prince's private 
yacht, and certainly made one voyage around the Isle of 
Man. There was some trouble about the Prince's bets 
at the derby races, which is said to have led to an estrange- 
ment between them. 

Returning to Texas, in 1882, was elected to Congress from 
the Galveston District and made himself notorious by in- 



A SHORT SKETCH OP THOS. P. OCHILTREE. 51 

troducing a resolution commending in strong terms Herr 
Lasker, a Socialist, who died in Galveston and who had 
been expelled from Prussia. The resolution, undebated, 
passed, of course, and gave the world a sensation. 

Tom died a bachelor, a Confederate, and a Union patriot. 
He was true to the Confederacy while it lasted. In the 
new political shuffle and deal he took a hand with Generals 
Mahone, Longstreet and others, differing from the mass 
of his friends. For that matter, so did St. Paul— a personal 
matter, and we should criticise neither without charity. 
Tom and St. Paul might both be right. 

About the time Tom was in England the boys told some 
queer tales, showing his standing at court. To illustrate: 
Once on a grand occasion at Windsor Palace, the Queen, 
gorgeously attired, was ascending the grand stair, when 
Tom rather roughly slapped her majesty on the shoulder. 
Turning with royal indignation and observing Tom, her 
countenance relaxed into a pleasant smile and she remarked, 
"0, it is you, Tom." 

"The evil that men do lives after them; the good is oft 
interred with their bones. So let it be with Caesar." 






QUININE IN THE SIXTIES. 



It has often been said that no generation writes its own 
history. Dr. Palmer of New Orleans in his great oration 
at the late Confederate reunion at Louisville repeats this, 
and in confirmation cites the fact that no full or satisfactory- 
history of the long war between Spain and The Netherlands 
in the reign of Charles V, was written until after a lapse 
of three hundred years and that history was penned by a 
native of another hemisphere. 

Some day a Victor Hugo, who wrote the "History of a 
Crime," or another Motley, in writing dispassionately and 
from the records concerning our reconstruction period, will 
tell of the facts of Congress of 1862, 1863, 1864 and 1865, 
placing a tariff of 45 cents on quinine, raising the tariff 
from 15 cents under the law of 1857 to 45 cents, and 
raising the tariff on Peruvian bark from 15 cents in 1846 
to 20 cents in 1862 and 1866. Quinine was a medicine of 
prime necessity in the South, which used twenty times more 
than the North ; and because of this tax and the consequent 
monopoly of quinine, it retailed in the drug stores in the 
South at $16 an ounce — its weight in gold. The law pre- 
vented importation from Europe and enabled the only man- 
ufacturers of the drug in the United States to enjoy a mo- 
nopoly. The Confederate States being blockaded on the 
South and invested on the North could only look for an un- 
certain supply dependent upon blockade runners. This 
law was repealed in 1868, but the high price obtained prac- 
tically during the reconstruction, for it was only placed upon 
the free list in 1868, when its price fell to $1.35 an ounce. 
This period from 1866 to 1868 marked a time of great pov- 
erty and suffering in the South. Negroes, as a class, and 
poor white people generally, could not buy this drug and 
resorted to the use of corn shucks, dogwood and willow bark. 
Hence many thousands died because of the effects of this 
tax. The South was then unrepresented in Congress, which, 
had it been advised as to the far-reaching and cruel effects 



QUININE IN THE SIXTIES. 63 

of the law, would doubtless have repealed at the close of the 
war. John Conness of California (an alien), Thaddeus 
Stephens and other malignant enemies of the South had it 
all their own way in Congress. For cold, cruel, hatred and 
revenge it far exceeded any law enacted by any State since 
the birth of Christ. Nero's persecution was because of 
religion ; so with Spain in expelling the Moors and Jews ; 
and so with the massacre of the Hugenots by Charles IX of 
France in the sixteenth century; so, too, the slaying of 
Mexicans and Peruvians by Cortez and Pizarro, incited an 
excess of miscalled religious zeal, which is being exemplified 
by Christian nations in China. But we of America were of 
the same history, religion and lineage and believed alike 
in constitutional government. Hence that cruel law was 
without the shadow of excuse and many well informed men 
think that its enactment caused more deaths than either 
of the persecutions mentioned. It has been truthfully said 
that civilization is but a veneer. Had conditions been re- 
versed, the South would probably have enacted the same 
laws. Let us be thankful for the unlooked for result, a free 
and united country. 

This bitter subject recalls a pleasant reminiscence; mem- 
ory of things long past, which, like distance, lends enchant- 
ment. That indeed is an ill wind that blows no one good, 
and I profited by that mean law. H. G. Hendricks and 
myself attended the first session of the District Court held 
in Johnson County after the war. Buchanan was then the 
county seat, situated away from water, on the high prairie, 
twenty-six miles due south of Fort Worth on the old mili- 
tary road between Fort Worth and Fort Graham on the 
Brazos. There is no town there now, for Cleburne has ab- 
sorbed it. The Johnson County Court was important. That 
county then embraced Hood, Somervell and a part of Ellis 

counties. The officers were Scott, Judge (appointee) ; 

James Hiner, Clerk, and Joseph Shaw, Sheriff. 

A party kept the saloon, a brand new one, built of post 
oak logs, about twelve feet square and covered with oak 
boards. It had a loft, approached by a ladder. His stock 
j'l trade was one barrel of New Dexter. You could smell 



54 EARLY DAYS OF FORT W RTH. 

the oak timbers on entering, which I did, on business bent. 
Saturday came and our court was about to adjourn. I had 
defended the party who owned the saloon in several small 
cases and in one serious one. He had paid the fees in the 
misdemeanor cases with stock in trade, but concerning the 
larger fee, he told me, in a mysterious way, that he was out 
of money, but had a quantity of French quinine, which 
he had "confiscated" at i'yls^. where he was guard in the 
Confederate army at the wind-up ; that owing to the Uncle 
Jimmy Gathan and other troubles, he was afraid to keep 
it, and had it in a trunk upstairs. Now, I had refused, on 
the advice of Jacob Samuels, m^y merchant, to appropriate 
some thirty bales of Confederate wool, vv^hich I found stored 
in one end of my office in Fovt Worth, arid which Uncle Isaac 
Duke Parker took in the name of the United States. This 
wool was worth 50 cents a pound, and v\^as actually 
in my possession, and I regretted not having confis- 
cated it. So, profiting by my experience, I told my 
client I would take the drug ar.d credit it as far as it 
would go. Getting my saddlebags and my black-dyed Yan- 
kee overcoat, up the ladder we went, and from an old hair 
trunk filled the saddlebags and overcoat pockets with genu- 
ine French quinine in big-mxouthed ounce bottles, tying 
my clothing behind the saddle a la valise in returning hoire. 
In those days, Texas being a dryer country than now, an 
almost universal custom prevailed of stopping to take a 
drink just before crossing running water. It was considered 
bad luck to do otherwise; and the custom was venerable 
by age and sanctioned by public opinion. So Hendricks 
and myself, observing this custom, stopped at the bank of 
Nolan River, where I surprised him with a gift of part of 
the royal fee. 

Mr. Samuel J. Darcey, a wounded veteran, then kept our 
village drug store. He disposed of my fee at retail at $16 
an ounce, the whole amounting to several hundred dollars. 
At the ensuing term of court, no witnesses appearing against 
my client, he went hence without day. 



PATRIOTISM IN THE SCHOOLS. 



It is just one measured mile on Main street in Fort Worth 
from the center of the Union depot to the center of the 
courthouse — two of the finest buildings in the Southern 
States — inspiring one at a glance with the volume of ideas 
contained in those three words — wisdom, strength and 
beauty. Both of these no less useful than magnificent build- 
ings are furnished with flagstaffs. How beautiful on clear 
days to see our flag flying from these buildings! The cost 
would be so light, the effect so glorious ! 

When Henry C. Holloway was County Commissioner the 
county owned a splendid flag. Commissioner Barr tells me 
that it is worn out. Then buy another, or several if advisa- 
ble, and see to it that the Sheriff does his duty at the hal- 
yards. I know he will, for the law would compel him, if 
so ordered by your County Commissioners. 

The nation at large has at last learned that we old Con- 
federates long ago furled the flag we loved, and that W3 
have taught and teach our children to venerate and love 
the flag of our fathers. In England the war of the roses, 
between the Houses of York and Lancaster, lasted for near- 
ly two generations. It left England a united people, as is 
Am.erica today. 

The flag is the emblem of patriotism, and a nation with- 
out patriotism is liable to destruction at any time. We 
have several large public school buildings besides the High 
School building, each with its ever-naked, lonesome, solemn, 
yet inviting flagstaff. It is more important that the chil- 
dren be taught patriotism at school than any other study, 
and in this the national flag is the object lesson. Make 
manning the colors each weak an honorable office to be cov- 
eted by male students. Our law properly prohibits the teach- 
ing of religion in the schools. But patriotism? The schools 
should be the hotbeds of patriotic inspirations, symbolized 
by the flag of our fathers. 



SHALL THE WHIPPING POST BE REVIVED? 



Texas, separated from older nationalities, evolved writ- 
ten and economic laws peculiar to herself and enforced by 
local necessities. 

Punishment in the Orient by the bastinado and in Russia 
by the knout, suits their conditions, for jails, penitentiaries 
and reform schools do not exist in the deserts of Arabia, 
or on the steppes of Russia. 

So, too, in religious beliefs human races differ as widely 
as people differ from one another, because they are mentally 
noulded that way, and logically evolve religious beliefs ac- 
cordmgly. 

English speaking people from the time of King John have 
always and everywhere successfully contended for ^rials 
by ydry. Sometimes, however, owing to lack of prisons 
punishmient was prematurely inflicted before the court 
passed final judgment. 

A Case in Point. 

Some years before the Civil War, when this country was 
almost a wilderness, and when there was no town of Den- 
ton in Texas, District Court was held in a place called Old 
Alton, in Denton County. John C. McCoy, of Kentucky, 
was prosecuting attorney, and Gustavus Adolphus Ever- 
etts, of Illinois, was attorney for the defendant. Charge, 
theft of a saddle. The jury found the defendant guilty. 
Everetts immediately filed a motion for new trial, where- 
upon court adjourned for dinner. Resuming labor, Ever- 
etts presented his motion, backed by an able argument, 
during which now and then the defendant interrupted by 
pulling at his coat tail and finally said: "Stop it; they'll 
whip me again." During recess the Sheriff had anticipated 
final judgment by inflicting the punishment. 

How He Got Even. 

When the county site was finally located at Denton, Ever- 
etts got even with Mac, who was prosecuting a man for as- 



SHALL THE WHIPPING POST BE REVIVED? 57 

sault and battery, Everetts again defending. From the 
jury box couid plainly be seen the large new sign of "Res- 
taurant," where the fight occurred. It was about an evev, 
ly balanced case. Mac made a strong speech and properly 
pronounced the word "restauraw." Concluding for the 
defence, Everetts said: "My learned friend who lives in 
_ alias close to Frenchtown, and who speaks that language, 
is as much in error as to the law and facts of this case as 
he is in pronouncing the word "restaurant." Now, gentle- 
ment (pointing to the sign) , please spell that word with me. 
R-e-s; don't that spell res? T-a-u; don't that spell rester? 
R-a-n-t; don't that spell restaurant? And if it don't spell 
restaurant, in the name of goodness what do it spell? Of 
course the defendant went hence without day. 

Whipped and Cleared. 

Hicks says that his father lived on the side of a sandy 
hill in North Carolina. One day a man indicted for petty 
larceny was seen slowly wending his way up hill with de- 
jected mien, and being asked whither he was going, he 
solemnly replied : "To the courthouse to stand my trial." 
In the evening this man reappeared and when asked as to 
how his trial came out, with body erect and head thrown 
back, he replied. "They whipped me and cleared me; I'm 
all right!" 

Now, this was better for the taxpayers and for the defend- 
ant and his family than a fine or an idle time in jail. 

Shall we not revive the whipping post in Texas? It 
works well in one or two Northern States. 






JACOB SAMUEL AND LEE CHALMERS. 



The appearance in our city of the Hon. Lee Chalmers, 
Assistant Attorney General of the United States, recalls 
an incident in which Mr. Chalmers, Mr. Jacob Samuel, of 
this city, and myself, figured. We were bachelors then, 
Chalmers was an Austin boy, on the staff, and the very 
prince of good fellows. Until the winter of 1864 Waller's 
Batallion and Greene's Brigade had been on the move, and 
until we came to anchor at Virginia Point, near Galveston, 
we had experienced little suffering from want of fire-heat. 
Here in midwinter, on this bleak, barren sand beach, with 
poor water and miserable rations, with but three green 
pine sticks a day to the mess, without tents, in damp, cold 
weather, we had rather a hard time. I obtained permis- 
sion to spend two days in the city of Galveston, with one 
man. I took with me Mr. Samuels. Lee Chalmers was also 
off duty, and we three took in the town together, Sam and 
I on virtue bent, for the purpose of visiting the Masonic 
lodge. We were accosted on the street by a bevy of beauti- 
ful girls, who importuned us to buy tickets to a lottery draw- 
ing for the benefit of war widows and orphans. Now, I had 
ever held conscientious scruples against engaging in raffles 
and gambling generally, even to assist church festivals, and 
so informed my companions and the insistent ladies ; but Mr. 
Samuels said if the dice were all right the law of gravita- 
tion would make the result, which would be providential. 
Not daring to fly in the face of Providence, as it were, I 
reluctantly and with many misgivings consented and bought 
several tickets. Several of the prizes were valuable, and 
that night as the numbers of the tickets were called, the 
owners of the numbers advanced and threw for themselves. 
I got the presiding houri — the prettiest girl on any island — 
to throw for me, and won a gold chain and locket and two 
gold bracelets ; gave her the locket and chain, she gracefully 
bending her neck while I encircled it with the chain in my 
arms amid the plaudits of all. The bracelets I carelessly 



JACOB SAMUEL AND LEE CHALMERS. 59 

put in the hind pocket of my coat. Of course we became 
popular. Now in elections I abhor repeating, and no good 
Democrat will nor indeed can he now repeat; but there are 
times — well, that night Mr. Samuels slept soundly on the top 
of a cistern in the back yard, "While not a wave of trouble 
rolled across his peaceful breast." My Colonel, Ed Waller, 
and myself, were alike surprised next morning to find our- 
selves in the same bed. Sam and myself drew ourselves to- 
gether early in the morning, and on taking a careful inven- 
tory found ourselves strapped and "enhungered." Finally 
Sam found the bracelets in my pocket, badly mashed, and 
with them rapidly disappeared 'round the corner to an 
"uncle." Tres bolas de ora. And in a few minutes he returned 
with a hatful of Coonfederate money, with the aid of which 
we three spent two days "in riots most uncouth, and vexed 
with mirth the drowsy ear of night." It was an oasis in 
the desert of our existence, soon followed by the march; 
then Mansfield, Pleasant Hill and Brashear City, where 
General Banks so liberally replenished our quartermaster 
and commissary stores. 






CONFEDERATE REUNION IN MEMPHIS. 



The late reunion at Memphis was a success in every way. 
Mr. Andrew J. Harris, a kinsman of our historian, Judge 
C. C. Cummings, and whose palatial residence is three 
miles from the heart of the city, entertained General Van 
Zandt's staff with royal hospitality. Miss Maggie Cum- 
mings and Miss Lively, her maid of honor, of Bowie, Texas, 
were of the party. What with the hearty welcome, good 
cheer and music, we had a grand old time. The ancestral 
Cummings home, extensive lawn, large magnolia trees in 
full bloom, beautiful rose gardens, and esthetic taste every- 
where, unostentatiously displayed, suggested the Old South. 

I gladly accepted Mr. Harris' hospitality for the night. 
A member of the staff, our General Joe Wheeler (Colonel 
George Jackson), shared his bed with me. We were travel - 
worn, and after a large night-cap, slept soundly. "Not a 
wave of trouble rolled across our peaceful breast." It was 
rainy and chilly without, but an old-fashioned coal fire, 
music and mirth, made all bright and genial within. 

After awhile the young people suggested tales of war 
time, and when the ante was passed to me I told the follow- 
ing reminiscence : 

At the commencement of the Civil War the Confederate 
government confiscated the Northern enemy's property for 
the use of the Confederacy ; for instance, the firm of Turner 
& Daggett, in Fort Worth, were indebted in New York for 
$30,000 for goods. The firm paid that sum to the Confed- 
eracy, and after the war paid off their New York creditors 
also. United States District Judge Duval, being a Union 
man, was, by order of President Davis, superseded by Thom- 
as J. Devine of San Antonio. Judge Devine appointed me 
Confederate receiver of public money and properties for my 
portion of the state. Experience having taught me that it 
was more blessed to receive than to give, I gladly accepted 
the position, and obeying instructions, reported in person 
with bond, etc., to the court at San Antonio. 



CONFEDERATE REUNION IN MEMPHIS. 61 

The State Constitutional Convention had submitted to the 
people the question : Shall Texas secede from the Federal 
compact? At this time it was not a question of peace or 
war, for some Southern States had seceded and war was in- 
evitable. Governor (then Doctor) Throckmorton, Gover- 
nor Sam Houston, and M. P. Johnson, C. Caldwell, John 
Peter Smith, D. C. Dade and myself, among others of Tar- 
rant County, favored separate action for Texas and opposed 
the raising of a new flag. We were pretty evenly divided ; 
Tarrant County voted for secession by a majority of only 
28 out of over 700 votes cast. 

Returning from San Antonio, I visited old friends on the 
Mountain in Hill County, Louis Hutchison and his wife 
(nee Miss Laura Lawton) ; they were highly educated and 
wealthy, and had no children, had been to Cuba and else- 
where in search of health; lived — or rather, camped — in a 
one-room little log cabin in a beautiful grove near a fine 
spring and in the midst of an apparently boundless prairie, 
miles distant from the nearest neighbor and just dimly in 
sight of the Cross Timbers to the west. Louis and Miss 
Laura had found here in this quasi-wilderness what they had 
sought in vain, robust health. They were in love with each 
other and with their surroundings. They had a wagon, 
horses, a few cows and calves, and a glorious little garden. 
They told me they had no wish unsatisfied; were all in all 
to each other. I never met so happy a young couple. They 
were devoted members of the Baptist church. Louis had, 
like myself, been educated at the Kemper school, in Boon- 
ville, Mo. He was a stranger to Lord Bacon's philosophy, 
had never read Huxley, Darwin or Proctor, and only heard 
adversely of Tom Payne and Voltaire, and of the doubts of 
the Adamses, Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin 
on the Scriptures. He possessed the unbounded faith of a 
little child approaching the mustard-seed variety; he gave 
undoubted credence to the whale, bear, serpent tale, and 
all. Alas, the direful rumors of approaching Civil War 
had reached this isolated, happy couple, and clouded their 
lives. Conservative people were slow to express themselves 
politically, and I was at a loss to know where to place Louis 



62 EARLY DAYS OP FORT WORTH. 

until bedtime, when, after reading a chapter in the Bible, 
svhere Joshua commanded the sun to stand still and Moses 
had his hands held up, he reverently knelt at the old trunk 
and there, oblivious of surroundings, unburdened his pure 
heart and told his soul's sincere desire, which he had in 
a measure withheld from me. He said: "If the North is 
right in interfering with our domestic institution.-^, in hav- 
ing kidnaped and sold us cannibal niggers to educate and 
Christianize and then seeking to free without paying for 
them, contrary to the Federal Constitution and against the 
solemn decision of the Supreme Court, then Lord, help 
thou the North ; but, but, and if, O thou God of heaven and 
earth, the South is right (and we believe in our hearts that 
she is) in defending her property peacefully and legally ac- 
quired and held, then, O Lord, smite thou the Northern 
robbers hip and thigh from the rising to the going down of 
the sun even to the dividing apart of bone and marrow." 
I no longer doubted Louis's soundness. 

They on account of the war returned to Missouri, and 
there in that rough climate, succumbed to the terrible 
disease, as much victims of the war as was Uriah, the vic- 
tim of David the Anointed, the history of whose vile life, 
by the way, should be eliminated from our Sunday school 
and only found on the theological shelf of Carnegie's library. 






BROTHER DEHART'S POWERFUL PRAYER. 



As a general rule it is sinful to laugh at Divine services, 
but there are exceptions to all rules. Burns tells us that 
"an atheist's laugh is a poor exchange for Deity offended." 
Amusing incidents sometimes occur in moments and sur- 
roundings of great seriousness, and well balanced men ai;d 
women have been seen to laugh and weep at the same time. 
Shakespeare mixes the farce in all his tragedies; and evn 
Solomon, divinely accredited with 700 wives and 300 concu- 
bines, descends to the ridiculously humorous. Of all animal 
creation man alone laughs. We are told that there is a time 
to laugh, but sometimes we are tempted to laugh when we 
should weep. The intent constitutes the sin. With good 
intentions, but at fearful risk of offending the "cloth," I 
would recall an amusing incident. 

Our section, defeated in the unequal encounter of arms, 
exploited by carpetbag government, something like our "col- 
onies" now feel, our school funds robbed, with practical 
negro political domination, a stoical feeling of deepest gloom 
overspread the land, and culminated in religious meetings 
largely attended even in sparsely settled sections. 

In 1866 I attended the first Court of Reconstruction period 
held in Wise County, then a part of the Sixteenth Judicial 
District. Judge Waddell of Grayson presided, Em Hawkins 
of Ellis, District Attorney. Dr. J. W. Throckmorton (after- 
wards Governor) of Collin County, Joe Carroll (afterwards 
Judge) of Denton County, and G. A. Everetts, H. G. Hen- 
dricks of Tarrant County, were among the "visiting bar." 
We arrived in Decatur the Saturday evening before court. 
Brother Shaw, a man of deep piety, of ripe age, and presid- 
ing elder of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South, was 
holding a prosperous camp meeting some four miles from 
town, and on Sunday night we all attended divine service 
there on pleasure and business bent, for a while some of us 
were piously inclined, all were impecunious, and the litigants 
were at the meeting. The moon was full, the weather fine. 

There was present old Brother Dehart, a wealthy cattle 
owner, who was possessed of an article of spasmodic and in- 



64 EARLY DAYS OF FORT WORTH. 

termittent religion then prevailing; for awhile he rejoined 
the church and prayed in public in summer; he fell off and 
got cold in winter. He was small of stature and was the only- 
cattleman in Texas who wore a plug hat. He possessed 
an unusually loud, deep, musical voice, in volume equal to 
that of Mohamet's crier. He was not for prophecy or exhor- 
tation. He was powerful in prayer. Indeed, it was his relig- 
ious specialty — public prayer. Dehart was noted for using 
melliflous and sometimes unmeaning words ; so that they had 
the bigness and sound it was all right with him. For in- 
stance, petroleum was advertised in the paper, but unknown 
to many. It had been developing during the war. We had 
just learned of its great value, and of the millions made by 
its owners. During the height of the excitement caused by the 
elder's eloquent description of what G. W. Paschal in the 
introduction to his annotated digest called "an old-fashioned 
Methodist hell," Brother Dehart was called upon to pray. 
On the way to town we tried to remember that prayer. I 
remember the beginning and conclusion only. It ran some- 
thing like this: 

"0, thou all-sufficient, inefficient, self-sufficient being, 0, 
thou almighty, all-powerful, omnipotent, omniscient, omni- 
present, eternal, petroleum, insignificant, Lord Jesus H. 
Christ — eh — Jehovah God — eh — " and the conclusion, after 
a long breath — "And 0, Lord — eh — when thou art tired and 
done serving thyself with us on earth — eh — wilt thou take 
us into that upper and better kingdom, prepared — eh — 
from the foundation of the earth, for the devil and his an- 
gels!" 

Several cried, "God grant it!" but Brother Shaw exclaim- 
ed, "God Almighty, forbid!" 

An alarm of Indians being in the country broke up the 
meeting the very next day. All above named have passed 
in their checks, and like Elijah, "I, even I only, am left." 
My attorney, and some time mentor, tells me that our of- 
fense of laughing then was only a venal sin, a sort of mis- 
demeanor, and that he can beat it for me by pleading the 
statute of limitations, and Hyde knows. 




'UNCLE" JACK DURRETT, 

The Fiddler. 



THE CHARMS OF MUSIC. 



Fiddlers' Contest Evokes Memories of an Old Time Fiddler 

of Fort Worth. 

The idea of having in Fort Worth a fiddlers' prize con- 
test for the benefit of R. E. Lee Camp of Confederate 
Veterans is good and deserves success. All people have 
music in their souls, cultivated or dormant. The love of 
concord of sweet sounds is planted in the natures of lower 
animals as well. Music, with all people, is connected with 
ideas of the immortality of the soul. From the Indian's 
death song to the gorgeous notes of St. Peter's, music has 
ever been the assistant of religion. The Chinaman, en- 
chanted with his weird music, is oblivious to the charms 
of Norma and Somnambula. His music and his religion suit 
him, and he should be left unmolested in their enjoyment. 
Music is enjoyed very largely by association, and very 
many, like myself, enjoy "Dixie," "Arkansaw Traveler," 
"Coming Thro' the Rye," "Annie Laurie," "Home, Sweet 
Home," "My Country, 'Tis of Thee," and pieces like those, 
more than we do the average music of Mendelssohn or Mo- 
zart. The gift of genius that can compose a hymn and 
music like "Jesus, Lover of my Soul," is more to be desired 
than the wealth of a Rockefeller. 

The powerful effect of music on the emotional nature 
of man is shown in the following reminiscence : 

In 1858, Uncle Jack Durrett came from Tennessee to 
Fort Worth, an aged man, of courtly bearing, who had in- 
herited and spent two fortunes. Like Old King Cole, he 
was a jolly old soul, and a good fiddler. Then the eight- 
hour labor demand was unheard of, except by Masons. 
Business as such was only known in the cattle branding 
and round-up time. One evening in May, when the boys 
were congregated, as usual, on the west side of the square, 
killing time and listening to Uncle Jack's music, all eyes 
were turned to behold a fine, middle-aged man, dressed in 
steel-mixed homespun and riding a thoroughbred. Dismount- 



THE CHARMS OF MUSIC. 67 

ing he loosened his girth and hitched to the rack. He was 
evidently a well-to-do stranger, probably a land buyer, 
Now Uncle Jack was in his happiest mood, keeping time 
with his foot, with his head thrown back, and oblivious to 
surroundings. Hearing the music, the stranger silently 
advanced and stood close to the performer, and when the 
tune was finished, with tears coursing down his face, and as 
if speaking to himself, he exclaimed, "Dilcy Hawkins! Jest 
to think of hearing Dilcy Hawkins played away from Ten- 
nessee, out here in Texas. Please play 'Dilcy' again, old 
gentleman!" Uncle Jack readily encored, the stranger di- 
recting to the crowd a dignified and kindly look, and slight- 
ly extending his hand towards the proprietor, remarked, as 
near as can be remembered : "Gentlemen, will you jine me?" 
Ever thereafter he bore the title of Colonel. 

Uncle Jack accompanied the Colonel to Larrie Steele's 
tavern, telling him on the way about the county site con- 
test between Fort Worth and Birdville (which cost the lives 
of several good men). Coley Johnson, Hen Durret and Kid 
Nance, kids with instinctive love for a fine horse, led the 
charger to Netherley's stable. 

If the contestants do not equal Orpheus or even Uncle 
Jack, they will entertain by recalling halcyon days of 
'Auld Lang Sine,' when life was full of sunny dreams. 

Uncle Jack, the embodiment of dignified politeness 
and geniality, was a born talker, and talked well, too. He 
had a stereotyped memory and was long on details. Once 
started, interruptions might give him pause, but recovering 
the thread, he pushed right on to the goal, however distant. 
He loved to talk and to fish. He had been known to fish 
for two days in one spot without getting a bite. 

After mounting his horse next morning, the stranger 
asked Uncle Jack to tell him the road to Weatherford. With 
a bow-and-expectorating preface, he told him that Weath- 
erford was the county seat of Parker County, which was 
just thirty miles square and twenty-eight miles due west 
of Fort Worth; to leave R. H. and WUliam King's black- 
smith shop to the left, and also Fields' mill, where Judge 



6i EARLY DAYS OF FORT WORTH. 

Seaborn Gilmore licked the miller who was charged with 
over-tolling; then to cross Clear Fork below the Blue Hole, 
where Parson A. N. Dean baptized C. A, Harper, and where 
Larry Steele's steers and negro were drowned; rising the 
bank on the other side he'd see a log cabin with a wagon road 
on both sides, where 'Squire Stephen Terry married a couple, 
who, ignoring their tents, and against advice, lodged over 
night in that empty, unchinked cabin, which leaked like a 
sieve — it thundered and rained all night, I don't think they 
slept much that night; do you?' The stranger gave a smil- 
ing assent — the horse became more restless — proceeding 
Uncle Jack told him to take either road, for they came to- 
gether in 300 yards; proceeding due west he would leave 
the first house to his left ; that Uncle John Kinder lived 
there, concededly the best off-hand rifle shot in Texas, 
though Judge Gilmore, C. G. Payne and Paul Tyler were 
good seconds — the horse and rider became more restless — 
seeing this Uncle John said, 'The fact is, stranger, there is 
but one plainly traveled road from here west, and it leads 
directly to Weatherford. Follow that road and leave 
Prince's mill and Dr. Blackwood's tavern to the left and 
you will land at Carson & Lewis's brick hotel.' 

Raising his voice, as the stranger rode off, he said, 'Dr. 
Blackwell being from the State of Kentucky, you better 
stop with him.' 

Capt. M. B. Loyd says that the stranger stopped with 
Mrs. Curtis, who afterwards married Mr. Cullom and then 
Mr. Sykes. 

Uncle Jack straightened up, about faced and struck a 
bee line for Tom Prindle's saloon on the west side of the 
square. 






PECAN TIME IN BIRDVILLE. 



Our constitution wisely provides that in all criminal 
prosecutions the accused shall be confronted with the wit- 
nesses against him. 

In the days of reconstruction Birdville used the pub- 
lic school house for religious worship. Lon Barkley, a lad of 
about sixteen, with new red-top boots, pants inside, inclined 
to a different faith to Parson W., a very nervous spare made 
man, a local preacher. 

The latter took Phillip and the eunuch for his text. It 
was pecan time, a heavy crop, and^the floor was covered 
with hulls. Every time Mr. W. made a 'p'int,' down would 
come Lon's boot heels on the hulls, till W. Prematurely ad- 
journed his meeting. Lon was indicted, charged with dis- 
turbing reHgious worship, and Rev. W. was State's witness. 

"In the cross-examination I asked him to state to the 
court and jury his feelings toward the defendant. He said, 
with a pious sigh of resignation, looking toward the ceiling, 
"As for the lad, in the Spirit I do dearly love him, but" (look- 
ing sternly at the defendant, with uplifted arm and cleanched 
fist, and with a loud voice) "as for the lad in the flesh, I 
do hate, abominate and abhor him, so help me God.' 

"Defendant was acquitted on the ground that Parson 
W. could not hold a religious meeting under the statutes. 

"Lon yet says the other boys did it." 






I 



UNCLE JOHN KINDER. THE FAMOUS SHOT AND 
HUMANITARIAN. 



It was in Fort Worth, the first day of the fall term of 
the District Court, in 1858. The grand jury had been em- 
paneled and charged and the docket sounded. The term 
was limited to one week, which required day and night 
work, especially on the part of the clerk. A shooting match 
was on the tapis and many rifles were in sight. All hands, 
including the court and jurors, adjourned to the bottom 
at the junction of the Trinity Rivers where the power house 
stands, and where Uncle Charley Daggett had a ferry. Here 
an unbranded 7-year-old break-fence steer stood lariated 
to a young pecan tree. He was a beauty. Red-and-white 
pied, fat as mud, with horns stained red with poke-berries 
and, surrounded by the admiring crowd, who variously com- 
mented on the marksmanship of the contestants. The rule 
was fifty yards off-hand and seventy-five yards with a rest, 
at the option of the marksman. 

Uncle John Kinder, who lived at the site of Arlington 
Heights, being the oldest man — in his sixties — was given 
the first shot. He was a pioneer from Illinois, over six 
feet tall, a kindly man, with cold, steel-gray eyes, and a 
Universalist in belief. He loved his rifle. She was long 
and heavy, maple-stocked and silver-mounted — carried thir- 
ty-two to the pound. Her hair-triggers (which Randolph 
abominated) were as sensitive as the mimosa. When Uncle 
John toed the mark all were silent and intense. Closely 
shaved, with head thrown back, he stood as straight as 
a pine, resting his body on his right leg, the left well ex- 
tended; for only a moment he sighted. Firing, a shout 
went up from non-contestants. The center had been driven 
in. Uncle John had won. The hide and tallow also were 
his. 

That he was a remarkable shot there is no doubt. An 
old settler tells this: "Long prior to 1857, when I came 
to Fort Worth, on a calm, clear, lazy spring day, when 'there 



UNCLE JOHN KINDER. 71 

was not a breeze on high the gossamer to bear,' several men 
and post officers were at the sutler's store. Uncle John was 
there with rifle in hand, as usual. A young officer guyed 
him about his marksmanship, and, pointing to a large buz- 
zard, low-circling above, asked him to bring it down. He 
said : 'The buzzard is a useful bird, and to kill it would be 
against the law; but I will slightly wing him.' Firing, a 
small feather was slowly wafted to their feet, at which the 
bird, seeming unconcerned, wobbled a little. Slowly reload- 
ing, he remarked: 'Boys, I hate cruelty. Next time he 
circles I will trim him even,' and firing, behold! another 
feather from his left wing, with the bird flying off evenly. 
The feathers were of the same length." 

Now, in those days when local option was undiscovered, 
and all whisky was good, it was in demand at house-rais- 
ings and general elections; but shooting matches, where 
keen eyes and steady nerves won, were the exceptions. So 
the crowd adjourned to the public square and Uncle John 
was the hero of the hour. Here he bet A. Y. Fowler, a 
young attorney, that he would shoot through, or merely hit 
a box without the bullet going through. Retiring to the 
back room of Oldham's store, he unscrewed the small end 
of his ramrod, and with tow taken from his fawn-skin 
hunting pouch, wiped out the gun, and with a buck-horn 
charger loaded with powder, slapped the lock, rolled a 
round unpatched bullet down the barrel and inserted a 
loose paper wad within one inch of the muzzle, primed, 
half-cocked and rejoined the crowd. With rifle to his face 
he asked Fowler to bet, which he did, and on the bullet 
going through. Whereupon Uncle John elevated the breech 
of his gun, causing the ball to roll down to the paper, and, 
firing, made a small dent on the box. The two gallons went 
the round, including the bench and the visiting bar, more 
than once. The court had a good send-off. He was a 
hospitable, sympathetic, sociable and neighborly man. 



"The Simple Annals of the Poor." 

A few miles west of Fort Worth, in a little valley between 
Arlington Heights and Mrs. Henry Thompson's, during 



72 EARLY DAYS OF FORT WORTH. 

the Civil War, lived a poor, aged, one-eyed man, a plasterer 
from Missouri, named Malloy. He was a preemptor under 
the law of '56. 

His household consisted of himself and two children, aged 
5 and 7 years. Uncle John Kinder and Malloy were ene- 
mies, and, although neighbors, they had not spoken for 
months. Then wolves were numerous. One night Malloy 
fell sick and told the children that in the morning he would 
be dead, and that they must on account of the wolves stay 
in the cabin until sun-up, and then go and tell Uncle John 
to bury papa. Uncle John complied with the request and 
cared for the little ones. 



—>•-<•>-•-• 

^s--^ 



LEWIS H. BROWN FAMILY. 



Looking over the "Puritan" for August I was struck 
with the familiarity of the face and figure of Countess Adam 
Von Moltke-Huitfeldt (formerly Miss Bonaparte, of Wash- 
ington.) 

There was a something in the likeness which at once sug- 
gested that I had seen or that I was acquainted with the 
original. 

In 1857, Lewis H. Brown came to Fort Worth from Mary- 
land, near the city of Baltimore. His wife and five child- 
ren came with him. Misses Lou and Ruth, pretty and ac- 
complished young women, and Horatio, George and Harry, 
boys of honor and integrity. I think they are all dead now. 

Mrs. Lewis Brown was a sister to Mrs. Jerome Bonaparte, 
the sister-in-law of the great Napoleon, and her above 
named children were cousins of the Countess, whose pic- 
ture in the "Puritan" arrested my attention. 

Horatio Brown was a member of my company in the 
Confederate army. I know the family intimately and hence 
my recognition of the family resemblance between the 
Countess and her whilom Texas kindred. 

The "Puritan" article reads : 

An American Countess. 
"Scarcely a season passes without a marriage between 
some Washington belle and a member of one of the foreign 
legations at the American capital. One of the latest acqui- 
sitions of the diplomatic corps is the Countess Adam Von 
Moltke-Huitfeldt, nee Bonaparte, whose maiden name sug- 
gests a historical international romance. She is the great 
granddaughter of the Miss Elizabeth Patterson, of Balti- 
more, who became the wife — the legal, though discarded 
wife — of Jerome Bonaparte, King of Westphalia, and 
brother of the great Napoleon. On the side of her mother, 
who was Miss Caroline Leroy Appleton, she is a great 
granddaughter of Daniel Webster. The Empress Eugenie 
was her godmother." 



SANTA ANNA'S SILVER WASH BASIN. 



There is inate in the human mind a regard for relics and 
curios carried by some even to the extent of quasi worship. 

Do I believe in encouraging such regard ? I do, when the 
end favors altruism or patriotism. 

Just after the war with Mexico, I remember when trav- 
eling on the Mississippi River below St. Louis, all the pas- 
sengers went on deck to get a better view of ''Old Whitie," 
General Zachary Taylor's war horse grazing in a pasture. 

What kid visits the National Capital without a sight of 
General Washington's well-worn clothes and his camp uten- 
sils used at Valley Forge and the wall papering at Mount 
Vernon done by General La Fayette's own hands. 

But right here in Tarrant County Mrs. Josephine Ryan, 
the step-granddaughter of Capt. E. M. Daggett, owns the 
silver tuash basin captured from General Santa Anna by 
Daggett in the Mexican War in 1847. Captain Daggett 
commanded a cavalry company in the famous Jack Hays 
Texas Regiment at the time. In 1857, General Houston 
and Hardin R. Runnels were candidates for Governor of 
Texas. Runnels was the nominee of the Democratic Waco 
Convention, of which Daggett was a member, while Hous- 
ton ran independently. General Houston and Lewis T. 
Wigfall — who spoke in behalf of Runnels — met in discus- 
sion at Birdville in this county, but passed the night in 
Fort Worth. Runnels accepted the hospitality of Col. Nat 
Terry while Capt. Daggett entertained General Houston. 
Houston's wound in the leg, received in the battle of San 
Jacinto in 1836, was a running sore, and in fact never 
healed. It neaded frequent dressing, and Captain Dagget 
used this Santa Anna silver wash bowl that night, and with 
his own hands dressed the wound. Nevertheless Captain 
Daggett voted for Runnels, although he was a dear lover 
of Houston. General Houston was not then forgiven by 
the people of Texas for presenting to the United States 
Senate the "petition of ten thousand vice-regents of Heaven 



SANTA ANNA'S SILVER WASH BASIN. 75 

(preachers) for the abolition of slavery in the District of 
Columbia and in the ports, arsenals and dock yards of the 
United States." 

Surely, this relic, hallowed by such memories should be 
deposited in our Carnegie Library with the curios pre- 
sented by Capt. M. B. Loyd, Judge A. W. Terrell and other 
donors, to be seen of all. 

True, we have the face of Captain Daggett on our city 
seal, but his name could better be perpetuated by present- 
ing this historical relic as indicated. 



.-^ ^^^ 
^^^^m 



OVERLAND TRIP TO CALIFORNIA IN '52 WITH EX- 
TRACTS FROM MY OLD DIARY. 



My wife placed in my hands an old book containing mem- 
oranda of my overland trip to California in 1852, and asked 
me to write an account of that journey. 

I was raised on a farm near Booneville, Mo., and was edu- 
cated there at Kemper school. Of course most of my asso- 
ciates were frontier boys. All could swim, and most of them 
were good shots, I had read Lewis & Clark's book, Cooper's 
novels, and Irving's works, but longed to see the Great 
West for myself. Two years I had lived in St. Joseph, Mo., 
with my brother and guardian, A. W. Terrell. 

At this point most of the California, Salt Lake, and 
Oregon emigrants bought their outfit, a matter of 
great importance for a journey of sixteen hundred 
miles through a wilderness, where neither love nor money 
could procure the necessaries of life. My company was com- 
posed of three : A. Fuqua, a widower, farmer, 35 years old ; 
Powhatan B. Whitehead, a cowboy, 23, and myself, 20 years 
old. I owned most of the outfit. Our wagon was well cov- 
ered and had sideboards extending over the wheels, afford- 
ing room for sleeping in rainy weather, but ordinarily we 
preferred sleeping on the ground. We had three yoke of 
oxen, one yoke of milch cows, a good dog — Ranger — a few 
extra yoke bows, some small rope, two horses, some extra 
horseshoes and nails, axe, hatchet, auger and a few other 
things in that line in the tool box. As for medicines, five 
gallons of pure cognac brandy, some Tutt's pills and a few 
bottles of lemon syrup and acetic acid to counteract alkali 
water, constituted our dispensary. 

Thinking the trip to Sacramento City could be made in 
four months, provisions were laid in accordingly, consist- 
ing of flour in sacks, prepared corn meal, dried fruit, rice, 
beans, coffee, tea, bacon, etc. We had a tray, an oven, two 
frying pans, skillet and coffee pots, two water buckets, a 
lantern, candles, tin plates, cups, matches, etc. Of course 



OVERLAND TRIP TO CALIFORNIA IN '52. 77 

we had good arms and ammunition, a plentiful supply of 
fishing tackle, and a good tent. The latter proved to be a 
nuisance, and in three weeks we threw it away, retaining 
the fly. 

On the 3rd day of May, 1852, I started from St. Joseph, 
Mo., and camped four miles above the city, at Duncan's 
Ferry. Under a written contract with my partners I was 
to neither cook, drive nor milk, but was to care for my own 
horse and stand guard only. This was like written repub- 
lican constitutions to the Latin races — good in theory but 
bad in practice. I could yoke up and drive oxen, but 
could not milk. However, there was work enough for all, 
and we got on well to the last, except as to the milking. My 
partners loved coffee. The cows were soon dried up, and 
I substituted sugar and water for milk. 

I always hated to tell my friends good-bye. The weather 
was gloomy, cold, and rainy, and I, drenched to the skin, 
slept in my clothes the first night in camp. My only rela- 
tive in Missouri had moved to Austin, Texas, and, raised 
an orphan, unused to labor or hardship of any kind, I felt 
for the first time practically alone in the world and de- 
pendent solely upon myself. 

Next day we crossed the Missouri river in a flat boat. 
Passing through what is now Doniphan County, Kansas, a 
most beautiful country, some twenty-five miles to the In- 
dian agency, dined with Major Richardson, the agent, and 
he, with his family, bade me God speed. "Drs. Beckham 
and Taylor are waiting here for Perry's train to take them 
to California." So even then passenegers were taken across, 
fed, etc., by contract, but never, so far as I know, with 
satisfaction to the passengers. 

The Wells family, also of St. Joseph, consisting of the 
aged couple and six children — five boys and one girl — the 
youngest. Miss Cassie, 18 years old, graduate of a New 
York seminary, and highly accomplished. She sang and 
played well on the guitar. The five brothers were 
illiterate, but stout, brave, good men, hunters and trappers, 
and for years had, with their guns and traps, supported 
their parents and educated Miss Cassie, the idol of the fami- 



78 EARLY DAYS OF FORT WORTH. 

ly. Their outfit consisted of two large wagons loaded with 
all sorts of provisions and absolutely all of their homestead 
furniture, from old bedsteads to the family clock. They 
even brought the chickens along, and they were trained so 
as to give little trouble. Mrs. Wells said she left only the 
ash hopper. Their teams were oxen and cows, and they had 
several fine riding horses and some loose cattle. Miss Cas- 
sie's four-year-old baby gelding was a beauty, but looked 
sie's four-year-old bay gelding was a beauty. Cassie's com- 
plexion was very fine, her hair long and black, and often 
worn "a la Indian." Her eyes were coal black. She stood 
a little over the medium height ; in form a very Venus. She 
loved books. I had brought some along, mostly romances, 
and when the weather was good we would ride several miles 
ahead of the train to pick the camping ground, and with 
books and fishing tackle whiled away the time until our 
folks came up. We thus traveled many a hundred miles, 
to Independent Rock, on Weber River, in now Wyoming Ter- 
ritory. A red-headed man from Pike County, Illinois, was 
working his way across with the Wells. He was very par- 
tial to Miss Cassie, always attended to her horse, and ex- 
pressed unusual concern as to her safety when with me. 
Of course I became suspicious. From the 8th to the 15th 
nothing of interest transpired except an occasional stam- 
pede and the many deaths from Asiatic cholera and small- 
pox. Dr. Beckham says that he attributes the numerous 
deaths to self-administration of strong remedies, coupled 
with unaccustomed exposure. I am glad we brought only 
the pills and brandy, yet untaken and untasted. Mrs. Daw- 
son, a friend from St. Jo., an elderly widow lady, died today 
of cholera. She was accompanied by two grown daughters 
and was their only protector. Their brother, John, is a 
wealthy man, a "49er" and proprietor of the Dawson House 
in Sacramento City. 

The officials at Fort Kearney estimated that over 31,000 
people, of both sexes and all ages, passed overland this year. 
The number that died can never be known. I saw hundreds 
of newly-made graves. In some instances the remains were 
buried so shallow that they were scratched up and de- 



OVERLAND TRIP TO CALIFORNIA IN '52. 79 

voured by wolves, the torn shrouds and bones being all that 
was left. Seeing this, some would haul rocks from a dist- 
ance to place on the graves of their dead, and thus 
baffle the wolves. This country was infested by a large 
gray wolf, as big as the Texas "loafer" wolf. They were 
more numerous near large herds of buffalo, and preyed 
upon the aged, young and diseased of these beasts. 

As a rule the emigrants honored the Sabbath day and 
tried to keep it holy by laying over. Sometimes we listened 
to sermons from divines of various beliefs. We were often 
regaled by good music, songs in different languages, and 
we had an occasional dance. 

The herding and guarding of the stock was of vital im- 
portance, and they were closely guarded at night. This 
caused great loss of sleep, and I, like Joseph in Pickwick 
Papers, was young and sleepy-headed. I more than once, 
in after years, shielded boy soldiers from punishment for 
being caught napping on guard duty. Every night from 
two to three hours guard duty. It was horrible! 

How, in such a multitude, far removed from civilization, 
without officers or jails, were the vicious restrained and 
punished and the weak and good protected? Judge Lynch 
presided; a rough tribunal, from whose judgments there 
was no appeal. Hung juries and new trials were unknown. 
His decisions were universally applauded — or criticised with 
rare discretion. To illustrate: One morning, cooking 
breakfast, two partners quarreled. One, stooping over a 
skillet, was, from behind, stabbed to the heart. His slayer 
was immediately disarmed and his hands tied. A man had 
presided as Judge in Illinois, a stranger, was forced to pre- 
side as Judge, and attorneys appointed to prosecute and de- 
fend; a jury of twelve men, also strangers, were empaneled; 
and, after argument and charge, the defendant was found 
guilty and sentenced to be hung — which was done instanter, 
from two elevated wagon tongues tied together, the fore- 
wheels scotched with ox-yokes, for there were neither trees 
nor rocks. The foregoing, set out in legal parlance and 
signed by the judge and jury and tacked to a board, was 
placed on the grave. 



80 EARLY DAYS OF FORT WORTH. 

We had been traveling in a northwesterly direction from 
St. Jo. "The country is a wilderness, abounding in game; 
it is very windy and cold," says my old diary. Right here I 
remember being on guard twice in one night. I made oxen get 
up that I might lie down and benefit from their warm places. 
Neither Fuqua nor Whitehead were good cooks. Anji;hing 
that was filling would do them, while I, stout as a bullock, 
was rather fastidious. We had been living on plain flapjacks, 
bacon and coffee. The cows were about dried up. My desire 
for variety was laughed at by the others, and although we 
had lots to eat in our stores, dried fruit, etc., they would not 
cook it for me, and I did not know how to cook it. I told them 
that to do my guard duty that night I would kill an antelope 
— numbers being in sight — so about 3 o'clock I pitched out 
about a mile from camp and hid in a gully, and by putting 
my hat on my ramrod and raising and lowering it, brought 
them within fifty yards. I brought down a fat buck and 
packed his hams to camp. Pow went for the remainder 
and only returned with part. The ever watchful wolves 
got the rest. Who would think that ambition, away out 
here in the wilderness, would exist? I copy from my jour- 
nal : "We would have had quite a pleasant time but for 
the disposition of some to push themselves forward as 
captains and commanders." Met Mr. Joseph Rheohadeux, 
of St. Jo. He had counted 3,500 wagons between this and 
Fort Laramie. 

24th of May: Am troubled with great boil on my neck. 
Arrived at the Main Platte, which gives its turbid appear- 
ance to the Missouri. Had a good bath, and wadid across 
to Grand Island, in water only two feet deep. Arrived at 
Fort Kearney. The commander told me that he would not 
furnish government provisions to those going west, but 
would give provisions to those discouraged and wishing to; 
return to the States. He furnished me the following: 

"Going West to Date— 8,174 men, 1,286 women, 1,776 
children, 2,543 horses, 2,316 mules, 26,269 cattle, 264 
wagons, 501 sheep, and one hog." 

So we were just in the rear of one-third of the total west- 
ward emigration for the year. This from the journal: 



OVERLAND TRIP TO CALIFORNIA IN '52. 



81 



"Twelve miles above Fort Kearney, at the junction of the 
roads, we held a council and unanimously agreed to cross 
the river and take the Council Bluffs road." 

Here the river is from one to two miles wide and from 
two to four feet deep, with quicksand bottom, and in cross- 
ing the wagon made a noice like the rolling of pork barrels. 
I waded over half way across, assiting the drivers. Camped 
half a mile below the ford, on second bottom; lifted the 
wagon bed with props above the running gear so as to keep 
provisions from getting wet. The flour sacks did get wet. 
I feared that it would spoil the flour, but an old trapper 
said, "This little bath will do it good; only the sacks are 
wet;" and he was right. Here we brought out the wash- 
boards and did general washing. It was my first experience, 
and I was not included in the "contract." Some beautiful 
mountain streams flow south into the Platte, and one d-av 
Miss Cassie and I, going up stream to find a spring, on turn- 
ing a hill came within 300 yards of a large Pawnee Indian 
camp. Halting, I told her to flee to the train, some three 
miles south of us, while I followed slowly, covering her re- 
treat, until admonished by the proximity of the Indians 
and a shot from them, when I double-quicked and joined her 
in about 300 yards of our train. She saw the Indians, and 
heard the shooting; it was a nice little scare. The Indians 
did all in their power to herd the buffalo and other game 
from the trail. Feeling somewhat of a hero, I called on 
the Wells that night. Of course our being chased was the 
theme, and the speed of our horses alone saved us. The 
red-haired man's remarks were not complimentary. Fool 
that I was, I was too young then to understand. We would 
miss the Wells. Today we had a feast. Joe Wells killed 
a young elk and divided. But for Buffalo chips we would 
fare badly for fuel. "Pow" takes one side of an open two- 
bushel sack, and I, holding the other side, in a walk of a 
hundred yards, we filled it with old buffalo chips. It is 
best first to start a small wood fire, placing elk and deer 
horns above, to insure ventilation; then cover with chips, 
and in a short time you have a good fire. Wait a little, and 



82 EARLY DAYS OF FORT WORTH. 

from the horns and bones you have a lasting fire for boil- 
ing purposes. 

Here we have the buffalo, the Indian's beef, furnishing 
robes and fuel. With the buffalo passes the wolf, which 
feeds upon them ; then the beef steer appears ; the bear, the 
Indian's bacon, lapses, and lo, the hog appears, for the 
white man — and the upbuilding of our Fort WortJi. 

Several hundred of the Mormons, from nearly every 
country in Europe, wintered in St. Jo. and en route to 
Salt Lake. Many small, two-wheeled carts are hauled by 
their young women, tandem, being loaded with children, 
etc. They get along about as well as we do. Young women 
stand hardship and exposure far better than men or their 
elders of either sex. They dance longer, with more vim, 
retire later and get up earlier than the opposite sex. I met 
quite a belle, a well educated Morman English lady, at a 
ball at the City Hotel in St. Jo., then kept by Major A. J. 
Vaughn. She loved to defend her church and boldly an- 
nounced her belief in polygamy, and attributed the physical 
superiority of the Turks to their temperate lives and this 
plank in their religious platform. These people are good 
mechanics; some well educated; but all off color on the 
Bible question, and my study of them has caused me to 
be exceedingly charitable concerning their belief in the un- 
known and unknowable. 

Col. A. W. Doniphan, who led the famous expedition 
through North Mexico in 1847, the hero of the battle of 
Sacramento, and who was instrumental in expelling the Mor- 
mons from Missouri, gave me a letter of introduction to 
Brigham Young. I wanted to go through Salt Lake City, 
but, although owner of the outfit, I had but one vote, and 
north of Salt Lake we went, about 100 miles. The Mor- 
mons having been roughly expelled from Illinois and Mis- 
souri, hated people from those States, therefor Illinois and 
Missouri emigrants, as a rule, took the northern route. That 
emigrants from these States were roughly handled by the 
Mormons there is no doubt. Even at that time, the Federal 
Judge had been expelled from Utah; the year following 
(1853) Col. Steptoe, of the Army, was appointed Governor 



OVERLAND TRIP TO CALIFORNIA IN '52. 83 

in place of Brigham Young, removed, but Brigham said, "I 
am and will be Governor, and no power can hinder it until 
the Lord Almighty says, 'Brigham, you need not be Governor 
any longer ;' " and he remained Governor. 

This from my journal: "Came five miles to good camp- 
ing ground; attempted to hunt game we saw on an island. 
We forded ; I, being of low stature, led the way ; Campbell, 
being tall, followed with ammunition and guns ; he, less for- 
tunate than I, fell in a deep hole and lost both. Determined 
to have our hunt out, we went several miles north of the 
trail, and, seeing ten objects which looked like buffalo, we 
approached and so did they. It was a Pawnee war party, 
without doubt, and at that time they were not friendly. 
They separated and tried to cut us off from the trail. We 
had the best horses, and, after a two-mile run they stopped. 
In a little bottom we ran at full speed through a prairie 
dog town, a dangerous thing to do, but we were excusable 
under the circumstances. Two of our company remained 
at a camp after we started, and following, passed ahead, we 
having turned out of the road to camp. They walked fully 
thirty miles before locating us, who had only come five miles. 
My dog's feet were worn sore by incessantly chasing game, 
especially mule-eared rabbits. I shod him with buckskin, 
tied on below his dew-claws, but finally made him ride in 
the wagon." 

Here we are at Fort Laramie, a strong military position, 
situated at the junction and between the North and South 
Platte Rivers, the latter now mapped as Lawrence River, oc- 
cupied by a strong garrison which raises its own corn and 
vegetables and attempts to hold down the finest looking 
and most warlike Indians on the continent, possessing num- 
erous beautiful horses. Two years after this, in 1854, all 
this garrison, including women and children, were cruelly 
massacred by these Sioux Indians. 

The oxen and horses must be shod — cows even worse than 
the oxen, pull against each other in the yoke, which wear^ 
off the outside of their hoofs. Changing them in the yoke 
does little good. "They charge here at the Government post 
private enterprise with a pull — sixteen dollars for shoeing 



84 EARLY DAYS OF FORT WORTH. 

oxen by the yoke, and fifty cents per dozen for nails. Hav- 
ing two good blacksmiths in our company, we paid twenty- 
five dollars for the use of the shop for one night. Our men 
made shoes, etc., from iron obtained from broken down 
vehicles. They made sixty-four shoes, with more nails than 
enough, and worked all night, thus saving $20.75. We 
surely thanked Mr. Campbell and Mr. Forman. Strange, T 
am too feeble to walk, yet feel that I am perfectly well. 
They falsely accuse me of taking a whole box of Tutt's pills, 
because the box was missing. Are traveling up north side 
of North Platte; hilly, dusty and very deep sand; beautiful 
roses in sight, and general health of the voyagers good. 
Left the river; lots of blacktail deer. 

23d June. Camped on Sweetwater River ; with Miss Cas- 
sie ascended an elevation and obtained a most beautiful 
view of the surrounding country. One never tires of walk- 
ing. We have arrived at Independence Rock. Right here 
Baron Von Humboldt camped, on the north side, and caused 
his name to be printed — the boys think with common tar 
— high up, but in a concave place, where rain can never 
reach. Walking this evening near camp I saw the name, 
in pencil, of my school chum, Ralph Douglass, of Bates 
County, Mo., on a cedar tree, the very last trace of him his 
family ever had, 

I only mention the soda and hot springs left left behind. 
They exist in different countries; but Independent Rock, 
Echo Canon, and the Devil's Gate, to me, as curiosities of 
this continent rank with the Natural Bridge of Virginia and 
Niagara Falls. Arriving at the Devil's Gate we remained 
three days. Miss Cassie and I caught a string of small 
fish and loaded back to camp with cedar fagots. Made a 
trade with an Ohio man going to Oregon; swapped for his 
four splendid mules, in good condition, and gave him sev- 
enty-five dollars to boot and three yoke of oxen and two 
yoke of cows. The cows cost me forty dollars a yoke, and 
the steers seventy-five dollars a yoke, making the mules 
cost me about ninety-five dollars each. Opened a store and 
sold surplus provisions, clothing, etc., in opposition to 
Archambeaux, the trapper and trader, with Indian wife. 



OVERLAND TRIP TO CALIFORNIA IN '52. 85 

He has a store in twenty rods of us. How I hated to part 
from my animals and dog, all tried friends, for Ranger can 
not keep up with us now, going twenty to thirty-five miles 
a day. Swapped the wagon for pack saddles and some 
lessons on how to pack. I remember we placed the fat bacon, 
surrounded by flour. The principal difficulty was in learn- 
ing to pack our molasses kegs. Now came trouble. It was 
agreed by us that each should take seven pounds of baggage 
and no more. I left lots of surplus clothing; gave Miss 
Cassie miy books — of which I had quite a number — only 
retained a razor and strop, two pair of drawers and one 
strong hickory shirt. Only had one pair of well-worn moc- 
casins, one pair of pants — buckskin — which have shrunk 
above my pastern joints. My straw hat is about worn out. 
This old weather-beaten journal in my lap, and the New 
Testament given me by my mother, are the only mementoes 
I retain of those days. V/e listened to a good sermon the 
night we arrived at the '"'Gate.'' I sat by Miss Cassie. We 
talked of parting, etc., until late at night. I passed her 
wagon; a candle was burning in it. Extending her arm 
from under the wagon seat she told me "Good-bye," and 
said, "I made this for you." That worn, sad, old book-mark, 
worked that night, over fifty years ago, is yet in the Testa- 
ment. We had hunted and fished, climbed hills, read and 
"told tales" together for many weeks. It was real sad to 
part with Cassie, and, under the then conditions, I was 
just a little sorry for the red-haired man. 

Poor Ranger, he followed us for two days, but finally 
had to give it up, for we made from twenty-five to thirty 
miles a day, and his feet could not stand it. I was tempted 
to shoot him. I bought a mare pony from Mr. Rheubadeau, 
of St. Jo., the very hardiest animal I ever saw, foaled in 
these mountains; she did not know grain, and kept fat — a 
natural pacer. 

During the night the cayotes would attempt to steal our 
provisions, but we outwitted them by placing the provisions 
at our feet when we slept. 

Every day we are passing those gentlemen who, in a 
hurry, passed us. Generally their teams are poor and they 



86 EARLY DAYS OP FORT WORTH. 

realize that they drove too hard. We are following Sweet- 
water River and are delighted with packing, now that we 
are broken to adjusting the packs, etc. Camped on Little 
Sandy, clear and deep, but fordable. Am troubled about 
Mr. Fuqua's sickness, and neither "Pow" nor I know what 
to do for him. He can hardly sit his mule, but is better 
today. We are near perpetual snow. Heavy frost last night. 
Slept cold beneath blankets. At the junction of the Fort 
Hall and Salt Lake roads I took the latter twenty-five miles 
so as to avoid Green River desert. Green River is a most 
beautiful stream. Met my friend, J. Hoiliday, a Salt Lake 
trader, and his assistant, C. H. Littler. Invited to dinner 
by them. I was surprised. Eggs and new pork, new po- 
tatoes and other vegetables, obtained in Salt Lake Valley 
south of us ; so, as this is the third, I count and celebrate it 
for the Fourth of July, tomorrow being Sunday. 

July 4, 1852. It snowed on us tonight, three and a half 
inches. I was wet and cold all night, and in the morning 
every bone in my body ached. The two days following I 
was no better. They called it "mountain fever." It was 
bilious fever. 

One day, in looking across a deep depression to the top of 
the opposite hill, some five miles, we saw the trail and 
wagons there. The guide book said it would take thirty-five 
miles travel to make that five miles. We decided to make 
a short cut and boldly descended the hill, following what 
seemed to be an old trail. We found the opposite ascent 
too steep, and, going in a southwesterly direction for many 
miles to a valley, we saw two Indians herding horses. Turn- 
ing northward at the valley we were soon in a Sioux In- 
dian village. The Indians assisted us in unpacking and 
took our stock off, but did not disarm us. About dark they 
set boiled meat before us, of which "Pow" and I ate hearti- 
ly. Mr. Fuqua preferred jerked buffalo. The Indians re- 
turned our stock next morning. We in turn gave them 
some ammunition, and with a general hand-shaking we 
parted. Mr. Fuqua declared that "Pow" and I had eaten 
stewed dog. He said he saw the head and hide of the dog, 
and, as he never joked, we put it down as true. 



OVERLAND TRIP TO CALIFORNIA IN '52. 87 

Alkali dust is painful to eyes and lips in spite of goggles 
and veils, which are uncomfortably hot. Evidences of vol- 
canic eruptions abound. It seems that every spot of the 
earth at some time has had its seismic troubles, and I know 
that water at one time covered all lands, because I saw 
beds of unmistakable oyster shells on the top of the Rocky 
Mountains. 

On a hot day, fevered and jogging along on my mule, sur- 
rounded by clouds of alkali dust, I dreamed the same dream, 
or, rather, saw the same "vision" many times. I was com- 
fortably seated in a large, cool hall with floor of tasselated 
marble, and ceiling supported by massive columns. From 
a distance a coal-black colored man, perspiring freely and 
wearing a snow-white cap and apron, holding with both 
hands a silver waiter, slowly approached. As he drew 
nearer I heard the tinkling sound of ice in a pitcher. He 
slowly filled a transparent goblet with water. I eagerly 
sized the vessel, whose coldness I could feel, and tremblingly 
placed it to my parched lips — here I awoke, so disappointed, 
to see Mr. Fuqua through the dust leading the mare pony 
followed by the pack mules and 'Tow." This dream recalled 
Tentallus of old. 

One day at noon, while Mr. Fuqua and 'Tow" unpacked 
and made a fire, I took the bucket and went to a small 
mountain stream for water. Kneeling at the brink I saw a 
large mountain trout, near the grass-covered bank under 
me. I cut it in two with my side knife and secured the 
parts, started to camp with the water, and that is all I 
remember till awakened by "Pow," who said, "Come to 
dinner." The boil on my neck was immense in size and 
very painful. It had bursted, and they found me asleep in 
the sun on a big rock, the fish and water by my side. 'Tow" 
had cooked the fish for me. Two days after this I shot 
a chaparal hen and "Pow" cooked that for me, too. He is 
a big-hearted man, and has learned to be a good cook. 
Weak and alseep I more than once fell off my mule. He 
made a wide circingle, with buckles to come over my knees, 
to strap, and thus tied me in the saddle. We were travel- 
ing then, according to the guide book, at the rate of twenty- 



88 EARLY DAYS OF FORT WORTH. 

five to forty miles a day. "Pow" never got sick, for he had 
lived an outdoor life. Poor fellow, I never sav^ him after 
v^e separated at Diamond Springs. He and Mr. Fuqua died 
w^ithin three years after crossing. We made a great mis- 
take in parting with the wagon and its hundreds of com- 
forts. Although slow, it was sure. The Wells were six 
months en route, but they came through healthy, with 
their stock in fine condition, when beef steak was worth 
fifty cents a pound. We had such confidence in our stock 
that we only hoppled one at a time and stood no guard. 
One night, camped near a willow thicket on a river, the 
stock came, frightened, to the very camp fire, caused 
by prowling Digger Indians, the lowest beings in the scale 
of humanity without a doubt. They would, from the wil- 
lows, shoot arrows into cattle, which, killed or disabled, be- 
came their prey. 

One day I overhauled one of these Indians and his wife. 
They had a worn-out emigrant pony, an old musket, the 
carcass of a freshly killed antelope strapped on the pony. 
I swapped a box of percussion caps and a little powder for 
half of the antelope, for which I was blamed by the older 
emigrants. We three, away off by ourselves, often tackled 
great questions. I remember that night, this trade with 
the Indian called up the question of the common descent of 
all men from Adam and Eve. "Pow" and I denied. Mr. 
Fuqua, a Presyterian, affirmed. 

There is a great comfort in so simple a thing as a canteen. 
Mine was first covered with several layers of woolen goods, 
then with hog leather. Saturated and filled at night, by evap- 
oration I had cool water all day, even when it was exposed 
to the sun. 

The legs of m.y buckskin pants, once too long, have shrunk- 
en till they are six inches too short, and so are my draw- 
ers. Going west all the time, the heat of the sun has blist- 
ered my left leg. I prevent this by tying a sage bush to 
my knee. I have no socks, and the moccasins are about 
gone. Every clear, warm day, is wash day, at the noon 
rest, when we washed and waited for the garments to dry. 

At this high elevation the atmosphere is very rare, and 



OVERLAND TRIP TO CALIFORNIA IN '52. 89 

the explosion of a gun can be heard only a few rods. At the 
Devil's Gate, where we commenced packing, Archambeau 
gave us twelve pounds of yellow buffalo tallow for shorten- 
ing bread and making gravy, a good change from pure ba- 
con grease, and no bad substitute for butter. 

At the South Pass in the Rocky Mountains there is a 
swam.p, covering an acre of ground and abounding in 
springs, flowing east and west, into both oceans. "Pow" 
and I rode to the center and drank to the oceans. 

A thousand details like these, which are not recorded, are 
vividly recalled by reading the journal. Provisions being 
lighter, I sold the weakest horse to a man traveling slow. 
Wind River Mountains are properly named. We passed 
south and westward to the country drained by the Hum- 
bodlt, by some called Mary's River. Saw Alkali Wells, with 
water even to the surface of the ground, but undrinkable. 
These holes are said to be unfathomable. We tied three 
long sticks together, with a heavy weight at one end and a 
thirty-foot rope at the other, Mr. Fuqua, who held the rope, 
thought he felt an under current. 

The bracing atmosphere has given health to all, and 
caused "Pow" to dream of fresh meat. He told his dream 
at breakfast. Going to drive up the stock, I saw several 
deer running; fired two shots at the bunch at short range. 
Returning, I told them that I thought one was wounded. 
*Tow" found blood, and sure enough, trailed, killed and 
brought hams and saddle into camp. We often talked of 
that dream. Here we laid over for several days, caught 
fish, and turned up our noses at fried bacon, and I at black 
coffee. 

A trip like this ought to make any man a judge of good 
horses, one of the best gifts of God to man. As a general 
rule, for endurance, large nostrils and sheth, with big 
barrel, fills the bill. 

Coming down Humboldt River, our general course being 
southwest, water became worse and worse until the sink 
of Humboldt was reached. All grass and water permeated 
with alkali. With perpetual snow in sight we constantly 
dreamed of sweet water. 



90 EARLY DAYS OF FORT WORTH. 

July 25. Arrived at the forty-five-mile desert. A man 
gave me a pint of water from Turkey River, the best drink 
I ever had. At 5 a. m. arrived at Carson River, just at 
daylight. The mules smelled water first and quickened their 
pace. In a half mile further we plainly felt the humidity 
in our faces. Trading post, by Californians, near the out- 
come of the desert. They sold water for twenty-five cenffe 
a quart, and a quarter section of dried apple pie for the 
same price. 

Carson is the prettiest valley I ever saw. Viewed from 
the top of the mountains, with the river, like a silver thread 
meandering through, skirted here and there with trees and 
luxuriant alfalfa grass everywhere. Every mile or so 
sparkling branches run down the mountain side, from the 
west. 

Stopped three days at Mormon station and enjoyed milk, 
pies, etc. The family is protected by a strong stockade. 
Traveled Johnson's Cut-Off over the mountains to Sacra- 
mento; sometimes too steep to ride comfortably, we drove 
the stock ahead, holding onto their tails. There was a little 
underbrush, and the soughing of the wind through the tall 
pine trees, and the resinous smell, reminded me of the 
Blue Ridge Mountains in Virginia. At night, looking across 
Carson Valley, many Indian camp fires could be seen far up 
the mountain side. Camped in sight of the Nevada Moun- 
tains and saw signs of grizzly bear. Some foot-packers 
have been keeping up with us for the last week. They are 
suffering for want of provisions. I am sorry that I cannot 
give them some, for I have barely enough to last me through. 
Came thirty-five miles today, passing through Placervillo 
(Hangtown), and in three miles from Placerville reached 
Diamond Spring, in Eldorado County, California. Putting 
up at the hotel, we could not sleep comfortably in the house 
and slept out with the stock. Sold outfit to Mr. Argyle, my 
buckskin breeches bring me twenty dollars. Went by stage 
to Sacramento, and I foolishly riged out in broadcloth suit 
and plug hat, not knowing that people would take me for 
a preacher or a gambler, for these professions only dressed 
in style. 



OVERLAND TRIP TO CALIFORNIA IN '52. 91 

The journal ends thus : "I have written this journal part- 
ly in the day and partly at night, when it was raining, hail- 
ing, snowing — in all kinds of weather — therefore it contains 
many mistakes." 

A year afterwards stopped at John Dawson's hotel in 
Sacramento City, on Fourth street, between J and K. Pass- 
ing the parlors a fine looking lady hailed me, saying, "Mr. 
Terrell, don't you know me?" It was Cassie. She said 
that all were well, her brother Jo had made a fortune mining, 
and that she was keeping a boarding house. She had a baby 
in her lap — its hair was red. 






THE MASONIC BELL AT FORT WORTH. 



When the writer came to Fort Worth, in 1857, he found 
a population of not exceeding 300 souls. The only preten- 
tious structure in the embryo city was a lodge building 
of Fort Worth, No. 148, A. F. and A. Masons, a two-story 
brick building, used for Masonic and school purposes, and 
the worship of God by all denominations. 

In Texas, as a general rule. Masonic buildings were 
erected first, and then came church edifices. This was be- 
cause Masons were united and the church divided, as now, 
into many warring fragments, and thus it was and is, that 
Masonry smoothes into a harmonious whole the roughness 
caused by the bigotry and dissentions of the sects, and the 
selfishness, ignorance and ambition of their leaders. 

Then the nearest chapter was distant a hundred miles. 
Many brethren traveled even a greater distance, through a 
country infested by Indians, to attsnd stated communica- 
tions of this lodge. Then we were on the frontier, a small, 
poor and struggling band. Now we have the largest mem- 
bership, and best equipped lodge building in the State, with 
flourishing Widows' and Orphans' Home built here by a 
donation of this lodge, and its friends, of not less than 
$9,000, raised and paid within the past two years. 

Nothing recalls more vividly those times than tne unusu- 
ally sweet sounding bell located on the roof of the lodge 
building, and which often calls the craft to labor and re- 
freshment. 

There is something in the sound of the old bell that tend- 
erly and softly recalls happy memories long forgotten, and 
keeps us in touch, as it were, with fellow-craftsmen whose 
spirits have returned to God. The shades of M. T. Johnson, 
Julian Fields, W. P. Burts, George Newman, the three Dag- 
getts, Sam Sealy, Joel Snider, W. H. Overton, Lawrence 
Steele, John L. Purvis, W. T. Ferguson, H. C. Johnson, John 
Peter Smith, and a host of others rise up before us. 

Who could but love, nay venerate, the inanimate object 



THE MASONIC BELL AT FORT WORTH. 93 

that conjures up such memories? No wonder old settlers 
love the bell ; it rang out the old year, and rang in the new. 
It sounded the fire alarm, called to divine service, rang out 
merrily for weddings, and tolled dirges for their dead. 

It was made in London in 1782, and was, in 1855, brought 
to Fort Worth, and owned by Lawrence Steele, who used 
it on the northwest corner of the public square, at his 
hotel, until 1871. Happily it escaped impressment, for 
bells were necessarily used during the Civil War for mak- 
ing cannon, and its remoteness from Richmond probably 
saved it. 

In 1871 Oscar J. Lawrence and his sister, Miss Mary 
Victoria Lawrence taught the "Masonic Institute" in the 
old brick lodge building in this city, and they raised the 
money by public subscription to buy the bell for lodge and 
school purposes. 

"Our much loved bell, our Mason bell. 
Could it but speak, true tales 'twould tell 

Of youth and home, and those old times, 
When oft we heard your soothing chimes. 

And so 'twill be, when we are gone, 
That tuneful peal will still ring on; 

And other craftsmen to brothers tell 

And speak your praise, sweet Mason bell." 

Long may our old bell be preserved to announce to the 
craft the hours of labor and rest. 



■>--H)@-^;-!(- 



IN MEMORIAM. 



Committee Report of A. F. and A. Masons Upon the Life and 
Death of J. P. Smith. 

To the Worshipful Master, Warden and Brethren of Fort 

Worth Lodge 148, A. F. & A. Masons. 

Brethren : Your committee appointed to draft a mem- 
orial and resolutions concerning the life and death of our 
beloved brother, John Peter Smith, deceased, beg leave to 
report as follov^s : 

"His life was so gentle; and the elements 

Were so mix'd in him, that Nature might stand up. 

And say to all the world, THIS IS A MAN!" 

On Thursday morning, April 11, 1901, John Peter Smith 
died in St. Louis, Mo., whither he had gone on business to 
further his life-work of upbuilding Texas and Fort Worth. 

The announcement of his death caused a shock and thrill 
of unutterable regret to the entire community, by which 
he was so highly and universally respected and loved. All 
were our dear brother's friends. None, "none knew him 
but to love him, none named him but to praise." 

After the shock had somewhat subsided we involuntarily 
asked ourselves the question "Gone? And shall we indeed 
see his f^^miliar face no more, here v/here he lived doing 
good for forty-eight years ; shall we be with him in the 
future life and there, with full identity, renew our love?" 

The great mystery of life and death, known only to the 
Grand Architect, is hidden from man, whose finite mind 
can not fathom the cause of his creation nor the necessity 
of suffering and death. 

We believe that if one worships God with all his heart, 
walks humbly before him, and does good and not evil, such 
an one will happily inherit eternal life. 

Our dear departed brother loved and worshipped God 
and possessed in an unusual degree the Christian graces; 



IN MEMORIAM. 95 

wherefore we have an abiding- faith that we will by emu- 
lating his virtues, be reunited with him in ''that house not 
made with hands, eternal in the heavens." 

Brother John Peter Smith was early left an orphan, was 
a member and regular attendant of the Christian church 
services; was educated at Bethany College, Va. ; was born 
in Owen County, Ky., September 16, 1831, and hence had 
nearly reached the three-score and ten limit. He located 
in Fort Worth, Texas, in 1853, and taught school here in 
1854 ; was a surveyor and land locater by occupation ; stud- 
ied law here with A. Y. Fowler, and was admitted to the bar 
by Judge Nat J. Burford in 1860. In 1861 he voted against 
the ordinance of secession, but follow^ed the fortunes of 
his State in the ensuing struggle. A member of Company 
K, Seventh regiment, Texas Cavalry, Silbley's Brigade, he 
participated in the campaign of New Mexico, Arizona and 
Western Louisiana; was severely wounded in 1863 near 
Donaldsonville, La., and slightly wounded at Mansfield; 
was present at the capture of Galveston in 1864; was ad- 
jutant of Greene's brigade; was promoted to colonel of his 
regiment near the close of the war, and disbanded his com- 
mand in Navarro County in 1865. 

In 1852-53 Brother Smith became a Mason, and was one 
of the original charter members of Fort Worth Lodge No. 
148, which worked under dispensation in 1854, and was 
regularly chartered in 1855, our brother being secretary. 
He became a Royal Arch Mason in 1858, and served two 
years as High Priest of our Chapter. On the 4th of Oc- 
tober, 1897, he was elected life member of this lodge, and 
exempted from all lodges dues. His mark is a coffin with 
sprig of acacia, recorded June 1, 1859. On the 16th of 
October, 1867, he was happily married to Mrs. Mary E. 
Fox, daughter of Col. James Young, in this county. Our 
brother and his wife taught the Masonic school here just 
after the close of the war. He leaves surviving him his 
dutiful and affectionate wife and five promising children, 
to-wit: James Young, John Peter, Florence C, William 
Beall, and Samuel C, the latter 16 years of age. 

He was twice mayor of Fort Worth ; caused the widening 



96 EARLY DAYS OF FORT WORTH. 

of our sidewalks, the building of the gas and old water 
works, and was one of the eight who erected the Pickwick 
hotel, aided in building the Main street railway and cotton 
compress, donating to the city land for three cemeteries, 
besides making numerous private donations. He gave thous- 
ands of dollars to build our railways. 

Although a man of mild and gentle manners, modest and 
unassuming, yet on occasion he could be firm and unyield- 
ing as adamant. When once he had fully investigated a 
subject he deferred his judgment to no man. In his do- 
mestic relations he was gentle, just, affectionate and most 
devoted. He was, indeed, a most lovable, useful and noble 
man. Long will his loss be felt by us and by all the com- 
munity as well. Never can his place in our hearts be filled 
by another. He stands out, as it were, from all others as 
a fine example of old Texas manhood. For by his own effort 
and merits he rose from a poor, orphan boy, seeking on 
foot a home in the village of Fort Worth, to become one 
of the most useful and dearest beloved citizens of the State 
of Texas. 

We recommend the passage of the following: 

Resolved, By Fort Worth Lodge 148, Ancient, Free and 
Accepted Masons, that we deeply sympathize with the be- 
reaved family of the deceased, and bow with submission 
and resignation to divine will in the taking of our beloved 
brother to Himself, where we hope to share with him eternal 
life. 

Resolved, That the foregoing be spread on our book of 
records, and that a certified copy hereof, signed by the Wor- 
shipful Master, and attested by the secretary, be delivered 
to the family of the deceased. 

J. C. Terrell, 
T. N. Edgell, 
C. D. LusK, 

Committee. 






THE SOUL. 

(BY JUDGE ALEX W. TERRELL.) 

Like cosmic wreck from a distant sphere 

Is the erring human race — 
Like atoms of dust we are drifting here 
With blind unrest, and a haunting fear 

Of the tomb as a resting place. 

We came to this world without our will, 

And will leave it with a sigh; 
For the mingled threads of good and ill 
In the warp of each life are weaving still, 

And will mingle till we die. 

We may question the stars of our destiny — 

The stars with their clear, sweet light — 
But the jeweled sky gives no reply 
To the yearning spirit's plaintive cry 
In the stillness of the night. 

From the mother's breast to the sexton's spade. 

There are tears — and toil — and strife — 
If when this shell in the tomb is laid 
Its soul like a flame burned out must fade — 
Why this hope for future life? 

No token comes from beyond the tomb 

To tell if the soul is there ; — 
Does a falling star portend its doom — 
A flash of light in the midnight gloom — 

Then darkness — everywhere ? 

No! No! There is something in us here 

That longs for a higher plane, — 
An inborn hope for a brighter sphere 
Where disenthralled from grief and fear 
We may live and love again. 



98 EARLY DAYS OF FORT WORTH. 



This inborn hope illumes the way 

When life seems too hard to bear; 
It was born with us, — and will ever stay 
Like the star that heralds the dawn of day 
To keep us from despair. 

If this hope deludes — then life is vain 

And cursed by an adverse fate; 
If the soul can never live again 
It's a curse more dread than the curse of Cain- 
And our God — is a God of Hate. 

No speck of matter around us here 

Is lost as the ages roll — 
Can the breath of God, who rules this sphere, 
Once breathed into man, now disappear? 

Can death destroy the soul? 

Self-conscious, but viewless as the wind 

That churns the ocean foam, 
The soul that is neither flesh nor mind — 
With its subtle essence undefined. 

Keeps guard in its prison home. 

And there like a watchful sentinel 

Its vigil in silence keeps ; 
But in whispered dreams will sometimes tell, 
Cf a far off home where it longs to dwell, — 

For the spirit never sleeps. 

The soul has never been seen nor heard. 

But lives to warn and to teach ; 
The fountain of tears by its touch is stirred — 
It quickens conscience without a word, 

Where silence is more than speech. 



THE SOUL.. 99 



Does nothing exist that can't be seen. 

And that no man ever saw? 
The earth in the spring is clothed in green, 
But who sees the life that gives it sheen ? 

Or the Source of nature's law? 

We call God "Father" because He made 
The living soul with His breath ; 

Can anger the Father's heart invade? 

Does the Father still His child upbraid? 
Will He burn it after death? 

Nothing but mystery here is found 

Where our senses feebly plod ; 
The mind constrained — by the finite bound — 
Can never the depths of creation sound 

Nor fathom the ways of God. 

No man-made creed can resolve our doubt — 

We are blind — and have always been. 
But can feel when God directs our route 
And the waiting soul with joy may shout 
With its faith in things unseen. 

Faith is nursed by Hope in the realm of Love, 

Where her spirit wings are given ; 
When her trusting eyes are fixed above 
She wings her way like an ark-bound dove 
To her destined home in heaven. 

In this chequered life of pain and care 

Faith whispers to console, — 
She can brave the storm with bosom bare, — 
Or like breath of spring where roses are 

Can cheer the departing soul. 



100 EARLY DAYS OF FORT WORTH, 



The parting soul will a helper need 

When it leaves this world of strife, — 
But never a man with blood-stained creed, 
For an angel plumed with love will lead 
When we pass from death to life. 

Harmonious nature every hour 

Proclaims a Sentient Cause, — 
Who wheels the planets, — paints the flower,- 
And gives the soul its spirit power — 

CREATOR of nature's laws. 

Oh ! wonderful God ! Thou art — nor can 

Thy love for Thy image fade; 
Thou hast created the soul of man, — 
No vengeful hate can distort Thy plan 

Nor destroy what Thou hast made. 

In Thee — the Maker — I place my trust : — 

Thou didst not create in vain 
This breathing clay — this pulsing dust, — 
This home of tears and sensual lust, — 

This prison house of pain. 

For pain is the tribute paid to bliss, 

And for future ecstasy. — 
The death pang is nature's final kiss. — 
The worm that dies in its chrysalis 

Revives with wings to fly. 

Every soul while on earth renews some stain- 
Some sin — perhaps unconfessed : 
But God will reclaim His own again. — 
The crucified thief did not ask in vain, 
But in paradise is blessed. 



THE SOUL. 101 



To God my life was a written page — 

He knew all that I would be; — 
He knew how the tyrant passions rage, — 
How storm-swept is all my anchorage, — 
And why I would drift to sea. 

I will trust Him in my utmost need 

To the resurrection morn; — 
He knows that my every sinful deed 
Was but ripened fruit from sin-germ seed 

That were sown ere I was born. 

To free our souls from the taint of crime 

Christ died like a God for us ; 
His words still cheer as in olden time, 
And the world's heart thrills in every clime 

To His tears for Lazarus. 

I see God's love in the fragrant rose, — 
His strength in each wheeling sphere : 
I feel His touch when the zephyr blows, — 
His mercy for all like a river flows. 
And my soul has ceased to fear. 

This trusting soul can ask for no more 

Than to keep its faith sublime : — 
The loved and lost have gone before. 
And wait for me on the restful shore 
That borders the stream of time. 









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